Third‐order Cartesian overset mesh adaptation method for solving steady compressible flows

Abstract

Abstract A third‐order mesh generation and adaptation method is presented for solving the steady compressible Euler equations. For interior points, a third‐order scheme is used on Cartesian and curvilinear meshes. Concerning the mesh adaptation, the method of Meakin is also extended to third order. The accuracy of the new overset mesh adaptation method is demonstrated by a grid convergence study for 2‐D inviscid model problems and results are compared with a second‐order method. Finally, the method is applied to the computation of an inviscid 3‐D flow around a hovering blade of the ONERA 7A helicopter rotor exhibiting an improvement in the wake capture. With a 7 million point mesh, the tip vortex can be followed for more than three rotor revolutions with the third‐order method. The CPU time needed for this calculation is only 3% higher than with a conventional second‐order method. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.