A "poor man's" approach to topology optimization of natural convection problems

Abstract

Topology optimization of natural convection problems is computationally expensive, due to the large number of degrees of freedom (DOFs) in the model and its two-way coupled nature. Herein, a method is presented to reduce the computational effort by use of a reduced-order model governed by simplified physics. The proposed method models the fluid flow using a potential flow model, which introduces an additional fluid property. This material property currently requires tuning of the model by comparison to numerical Navier-Stokes based solutions. Topology optimization based on the reduced-order model is shown to provide qualitatively similar designs, as those obtained using a full Navier-Stokes based model. The number of DOFs is reduced by 50% in two dimensions and the computational complexity is evaluated to be approximately 12.5% of the full model. We further compare to optimized designs obtained utilizing Newton's convection law.

arXiv commentPreprint version. Please refer to final version in Structural Multidisciplinary Optimization https://doi.org/10.1007/s00158-019-02215-9

References in corpus (4)

• A high-level programming-language implementation of topology optimization applied to steady-state Navier-Stokes flow
• Large scale three-dimensional topology optimisation of heat sinks cooled by natural convection
• Topology optimisation for natural convection problems
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Cited by in corpus (3)

• Topology optimization of heat sinks for instantaneous chip cooling using a transient pseudo-3D thermofluid model
• SEMDOT: Smooth-Edged Material Distribution for Optimizing Topology Algorithm
• A "poor man's" approach for high-resolution three-dimensional topology optimization of natural convection problems