Effect of Dissipative Terms on the Quality of Two and Three-Dimensional Euler Flow Solutions

The Euler equations are a set of non-dissipative hyperbolic conservation laws that can become unstable near regions of severe pressure variation. To prevent oscillations near shockwaves, these equations require artificial dissipation terms to be added to the discretized equations. A combination of first-order and third-order dissipative terms control the stability of the flow solutions. The assigned magnitude of these dissipative terms can have a direct effect on the quality of the flow solution. To examine these effects, subsonic and transonic solutions of the Euler equations for a flow passed a circular cylinder has been investigated. Triangular and tetrahedral unstructured grids were employed to discretize the computational domain. Unsteady Euler equations are then marched through time to reach a steady solution using a modified Runge-Kutta scheme. Optimal values of the dissipative terms were investigated for several flow conditions. For example, at a free stream Mach number of 0.45 strong shock waves were captured on the cylinder by using values of 0.25 and 0.0039 for the first-order and third-order dissipative terms. In addition to the shock capturing effect, it has been shown that smooth pressure coefficients can be obtained with the proper values for the dissipative terms.