Simulation of sheet and cloud cavitation with homogenous transport models

This paper introduces the results of correlated numerical models study carried out to analyse cavitating flows. The flow field of steady attached sheet cavitation and the case of unsteady cavitation behaviour with quasi-periodic fluctuations is analysed with different homogenous cavitation transport models. Three models in form of additional transport equations for water volume fraction are combined with the RANS (Reynolds Averaged Navier–Stokes) equations and calibrated for the cavitating flow around the NACA66 (MOD) hydrofoil by means of an optimisation strategy. In the second stage, the optimised models are applied to the case of internal unsteady cavitating flow in Venturi type section. The results obtained using calibrated models are very close to each other, and agree well with the available experimental data, indicating that the optimisation process is recommended as a general – first step tool for mathematical models validation.