1. Introduction
Cavitation, which refers to the formation of vapor bubbles within a liquid due to high velocities and strong acceleration at low pressure, has diverse applications in various scientific and engineering fields. It can be beneficial in marine design engineering for reducing skin friction drag and achieving high speed for submerged projectiles, as well as in medicine for treating kidney stones and cancerous bodies. However, cavitation can also have adverse effects such as material erosion, noise, and vibrations in marine propellers and turbomachinery, that can cause significant damage. Therefore, understanding the dynamics of cavitation is crucial, but it poses challenges in numerical simulations of compressible multiphase problems due to the complex physics involved in phase change, high gradients of flow variables, numerical discretisation choices, and validation with experimental results. Numerical studies often focus on attached cavitations, as they are the primary subject of investigation in most research [
1,
2,
3]. However, hull/bulk cavitation, which occurs during underwater explosions, is different as it evolves rapidly and unsteadily, changing dimensions before collapsing violently due to the surge in pressure, resulting in erratic and rapidly changing cavitation patterns. This makes numerical simulations of hull/bulk cavitation more challenging.
In hull cavitation, vapour bubbles are created on the surface of a submerged rigid surface, such as a projectile, ship hull, or submarine, due to rarefaction caused by high-pressure shock waves from an explosion. On the other hand, bulk cavitation occurs near a free surface between two interacting fluids due to the explosive shock waves, leading to widespread cavitation throughout the liquid. Hull cavitation is often more challenging to study using numerical methods due to its rapid and unsteady nature, while bulk cavitation is characterised by the formation of large-scale vapour bubbles throughout the liquid. Both forms of cavitation can have detrimental effects on marine structures and machinery.
In the context of hull or bulk cavitation, where regions experience extreme variations in pressure, negative pressure values are observed, which are physically unrealistic and can cause numerical codes to fail. To address this issue, two common approaches are used in diffuse interface models for simulating UNDEX (Underwater Explosion) phenomena. The first approach is to incorporate a single-fluid model, which has been used by several researchers [
4,
5,
6,
7,
8,
9] in similar UNDEX simulations. Various methods in this category, such as the cut-off model, vacuum model, isentropic model, Schmidt model, and modified Schmidt model, have been used to avoid negative pressure values during cavitation. The cut-off model assumes that cavitation bubbles do not form until the pressure drops below a critical value, known as the cut-off pressure, and is generally accurate in predicting peak pressure at the cavitation boundary, but may not accurately predict cavitation collapse periods. The Schmidt model is accurate when the void fraction (ratio of vapour bubble density to total fluid density) is less than 10
-5 [
4], but has limitations in calculating the speed of sound, making it suitable for high-speed cavitating flows. The modified Schmidt model is an extension of the original Schmidt model and addresses its limitations, thereby expanding its range of applicability to larger vapor-to-liquid density ratios. The vacuum cavitation model assumes zero mass inside the cavitation bubble but is limited in capturing the complex shapes and dynamics of cavitation bubbles in multi-dimensional flows. The isentropic model, which has been used in the five-equation diffuse interface models [
5,
10], is robust as it considers the mixture as consisting of isentropic vapour and liquid phases, but it requires more computational resources and the predetermination of a model parameter k [
4]. The cut-off model is preferred in this case as it is relatively simple to implement and does not alter peak pressure accuracy at the cavitation boundary, which is important for the UNDEX test cases considered in the studies. The one-fluid cavitation model aligns with the no-phase transition assumption of the five-equation interface capturing models used in this study.
The accuracy of the one-fluid model in predicting the details of the cavitation process, including thermodynamic aspects, in compressible two-phase flows, is limited due to its inability to account for mass and heat transfer between the liquid and vapour phases. To overcome this limitation, researchers have extended the simplified diffuse-interface models such as the four-, five-, or six-equation models by incorporating source terms in the energy and mass conservation equations to represent mass and heat transfer. This approach, known as the "two-fluid cavitation models," aims to prevent non-physical pressure occurrences in the cavitation region. The source terms are implicitly expressed using an algebraic relaxation solver for phase transition modelling, as proposed by Pelanti and Shyue [
11,
12]. However, this method is more complex and computationally expensive, especially for the seven-equation diffuse interface models such as the full non-equilibrium models of Baer-Nunziato [
13] or Saurel-Abgrall [
14]. A computational efficient and simple strategy in UNDEX is to employ a reduced diffuse interface models with phase transition, such as the four- or five-equation models, which enforce mechanical, thermal, or both equilibrium. Jun et al [
15] extended the phase transition model used by Chiapolino et al. [
16] for the four-equation model to study cavitation in underwater explosion test cases. Other existing diffuse interface models with phase transitions include those proposed by Pelanti and Shyue [
9,
11], Martelot et al. [
17], Zein et al.[
18], and others [
14]. Ma et al. [
19] utilised the Kapila [
20] variant of the five-equation two-phase flow model with thermo-chemical relaxation terms to investigate liquid-vapour phase transition in cavitating flows for UNDEX test cases.
The present study focuses on hull and bulk cavitation in compressible multiphase or multi-component flows, specifically in the context of underwater explosions. Two interface capturing models, namely the ones proposed by Allaire et al. [
21] and Kapila et al. [
20], will be used to investigate the cavitation phenomenon in this study. The performance of these models will be evaluated using four underwater explosion (UNDEX) test cases in the open-source finite-volume UCNS3D solver [
22].
To solve the interface capturing models, high-order central-weighted essentially non-oscillatory (CWENO) schemes for multi-component species within the finite volume framework, as implemented by Tsoutsanis and Dumbser[
23], will be employed. The CWENO schemes offer computational advantages such as lower cost and faster computation compared to classical WENO schemes, due to the use of low-order polynomials associated with directional stencils and their reduced size compared to the high-order polynomials related to the central stencil. These advantages will be fully utilised in capturing the dynamics of cavitation in the test cases considered herein.
The paper proceeds to
Section 2, where it presents the governing equations that describe the diffuse interface models of Allaire et al. [
21] and Kapila et al. [
20], which consist of five equations. It includes details about the additional
term that distinguishes these models, as well as the cut-off model used to prevent non-physical pressure values during cavitation. In
Section 3, the implementation of the reconstruction process of the CWENO schemes is described, including the chosen fluxes and temporal discretisation, within the finite volume framework using the diffuse interface methods mentioned earlier.
Section 4 is dedicated to the study of five test cases, where the proposed method is utilised to investigate cavitation occurrence in underwater explosions near different boundaries, such as a planar solid wall, a closed cylindrical container, and a free surface. The analysis focuses on parameters such as the influence of shock loading and cavitation collapse reloading on nearby structures like ship hulls or closed tanks. Additionally, the bubble dynamics of cavitating flows induced by underwater explosions near a free surface, as well as the impact of bubble separation distance on cavitation phenomena, are analysed. The numerical results obtained are compared with analytical, experimental, and reference solutions whenever possible. A comparison between the five-equation models of Allaire et al. [
21] and Kapila et al. [
20] is also presented. Finally, the last section provides concluding remarks and a summary drawn from this study.
2. The Five-equations Diffuse Interface Model
The five-equations model typically consists of two continuity equations, one momentum equation and one energy equation coupled with a non-conservative advection equation of the volume fraction equation. The common five-equations models are the Allaire et al. [
21], Kapila et al. [
20], Murrone et al.[
24], and Wackers et al. [
25] models, all these are simpler formulations or reductions to lesser unknowns of the full seven (7) Baer-Nunziato [
13] equations, which are often too complex to solve numerically. In this paper, we shall only be considering the Allaire and Kapila five-equations models. The difference between Allaire’s and Kapila’s model is only in the non-conservative advection equation in the volume-fraction equation. The equations are presented below :
where the subscript
represents the fluid’s component,
is the volume fraction of each component,
is the density,
is the velocity, p is the pressure and E is the total energy.
This class of five-equations models (Allaire et al. [
21] and Kapila et al. [
20] model) are often referred to as the mechanical equilibrium models. We assume that the momentum, energy, and mass transfer between the phases reach equilibrium due to the thermodynamic difference between each component. This reasonable flow assumption involves a free surface like the one treated in this paper. Note that this is a mechanical equilibrium of the fluid; each phase remains in thermal disequilibrium. All the models in this category can be expressed into the following general form of a non-linear system of PDE in multiple space dimensions:
where Q is the vector of evolution variables (conserved and not conserved), F is a flux function,
is the velocity field, and H and S are non-conservative quantities.
We then define Q, F and H in the form as presented in Eq.(
8) ( Allaire et al. model [
21]) and Eq. (
9) (Kapila et al. model [
21]) for a two-phase flow. The K
∇· v term in Kapila’s model [
20] describes the compressibility and thermodynamic properties of the mixture region of the two-phase fluid. It is derived from the asymptotic reduction of Baer-Nunziato’s seven-equation model[
13,
26,
27]. From Eq.(
5) and Eq.(
6),
term differentiates Kapila’s model et al.[
20] from Allaire’s et al. [
21].
The Allaire’s et al. 5-equation model presented in a vector form:
The Kapila’s et al. 5-equation model presented in a vector form:
For each fluid’s component i, the mixture is assumed to be in mechanical equilibrium as stated previously, the velocity and pressure of each component is and (i.e. we maintain a single velocity and single pressure for the mixture).
The total density, momentum, the kinetic and internal energy of the mixture is stated below:
So the total energy can be expressed as:
To determine the internal energy and put closure to the equations, it is convenient to use the stiffened EOS for both fluids components:
Using the stiffened EOS, the internal energy can now be expressed as:
and the total energy below:
From the five-equations, as shown in Eq. (
5) and Eq. (
6), the advection equation of the volume fraction is in a non-conservative form which will present some difficulties when solving our five-model equations. We simplify it into a conservative term using Johnsen and Colonius [
28] approach.
First, let f represent a vector in three-dimension and is defined as,
Divergence of
f then is:
And then,
Substituting
into the non-conservative advection equation of the volume fraction in Eq. (
5) and Eq. (
6) to obtain the quasi-conservative form, the equation for the advection of the volume fraction can be written as Eq. (
18) and Eq. (
19).
For Allaire’s et al:
For Kapila’s et al.
The K function in Kapila’s et al. can be determined from the Eq. (
20) where the mixture’s speed of sound is gotten using the Wood’s speed of sound as seen in Eq. (
22)
where
,
and
are given as :
The “mixture-mixture” speed of sound derived from the mixture stiffened-gas SG-EoS is used for the Allaire et al. five -equations [
21] and is given as follows:
2.1. Cut-off Methods
The stiffened-gas equation of state (SG-EOS) introduced by Harlow and Amsden [
29] has been commonly used by various authors [
28,
30,
31,
32,
33] to achieve thermodynamic closure for multiphase compressible flow, including flows involving cavitation. However, in cases where the pressure difference between the two-phase medium is considerably high, such as in underwater explosions, the use of stiffened gas EOS alone may not be sufficient. This is because cavitation induced by the high-pressure surge is very fast, unsteady, and rapidly evolves into various dimensions before collapsing violently, resulting in non-physical negative pressures when using only the stiffened gas EOS. Similar findings have been reported by other authors in their numerical simulations.
To improve the accuracy of simulations for cavitating flows, modifications are needed. One common approach is to incorporate an additional single-fluid model to circumvent the issue, such as the cut-off model, isentropic model, or Schmidt model, which have been used by authors in previous studies. Among these models, the cut-off model is often preferred due to its simplicity of implementation and preservation of peak pressure accuracy during cavitation collapse, which is important in underwater explosion (UNDEX) test cases. Additionally, these models are pure phase models that do not consider phase exchange, as noted in previous studies [
4,
34]. Further details of these models can be found in the references cited. In the cut-off model, once the pressure in the cavitation region drops below a certain fixed saturation pressure p
sat, the non-physical pressure computed assumes a new value which is the value set for the p
sat.
The physical saturation pressure (
) is chosen to be a comparatively small value in relation to the significantly higher ambient pressure exerted by the fluid, and
refers to the static pressure at cell
i. To avoid the negative physical pressure, most authors [
4,
5,
35,
36] assume a value between 2000-5000 Pa.
The mixture’s internal energy can be expressed as :
and the total energy is final given by:
5. Conclusions
This research extends the CWENO high-order finite-volume numerical framework employed for simulating multicomponent and multiphase flows, as detailed in [
59], to specifically investigate cavitation phenomena in underwater explosions (UNDEX). The application of the CWENO schemes proved successful across a range of intricate two- and three-dimensional test cases related to underwater explosions, yielding noteworthy observations.
Notably, the CWENO schemes showcase a remarkable capability to provide high-resolution and sharply defined representations of shock-cavitation structures, as well as the infinitesimal interfacial region. This is achieved by resolving material interfaces with minimized numerical smearing, eliminating the necessity for additional interface sharpening [
68] or compression [
71]. This takes away the increase in computational cost associated with incorporating interface sharpening or compression into the diffuse interface models.
The compressibility effect introduced by the
u term in the Kapila et al. five-equation models [
20], which distinguishes it from the Allaire five-equation models [
21] from our results shows that this additional term does not significantly impact cavitation. The similarity in results between the two models underscores their agreement with other published papers, affirming their reliability in simulating cavitation phenomena.
The results also show that the proximity of the bubbles played a crucial role in intensifying the shock wave impacts and the occurrence of cavitation around free surfaces and rigid boundaries. All these findings contribute valuable insights into dynamics of cavitation within the context of underwater explosions.
Author Contributions
Conceptualization, E.A. and P.T.; methodology, E.A. and P.T.; software, E.A. and P.T.; validation, E.A. and P.T.; formal analysis, E.A. and P.T.; investigation, E.A. and P.T.; resources, E.A., P.T and K.J; data curation, E.A.; writing—original draft preparation, E.A. and P.T.; writing—review and editing, E.A. and P.T.; visualization, E.A. and P.T.; supervision, K.J. and P.T.; project administration, K.J. and P.T.; funding acquisition, E.M. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript
Figure 1.
Computational domain setup for a two-dimensional underwater explosion near a free surface.
Figure 1.
Computational domain setup for a two-dimensional underwater explosion near a free surface.
Figure 2.
Underwater explosion near a free surface; 2D unstructured finest mesh with triangular elements used for this test case. The density of mesh elements in specific areas of the domain is increased to better capture the physical phenomena occurring in those regions. The zoomed-in area on the right provides a more detailed view of the mesh’s structure.
Figure 2.
Underwater explosion near a free surface; 2D unstructured finest mesh with triangular elements used for this test case. The density of mesh elements in specific areas of the domain is increased to better capture the physical phenomena occurring in those regions. The zoomed-in area on the right provides a more detailed view of the mesh’s structure.
Figure 3.
Underwater explosion near a free surface; Schileren visualization of density gradient using a CWENO4 scheme on a resolution of 1600 × 1600 cells (finest mesh) at ms.
Figure 3.
Underwater explosion near a free surface; Schileren visualization of density gradient using a CWENO4 scheme on a resolution of 1600 × 1600 cells (finest mesh) at ms.
Figure 4.
UNDEX near a free surface; Schileren visualization of pressure gradient using a CWENO4 scheme on the finest mesh at ms.
Figure 4.
UNDEX near a free surface; Schileren visualization of pressure gradient using a CWENO4 scheme on the finest mesh at ms.
Figure 5.
UNDEX near a free surface; contours of volume fraction for underwater explosion near a free surface using a CWENO4 scheme on finest grid at ms.
Figure 5.
UNDEX near a free surface; contours of volume fraction for underwater explosion near a free surface using a CWENO4 scheme on finest grid at ms.
Figure 6.
UNDEX near a free surface; density gradient contours at ms. Captured using CWENO4 schemes with different grids resolution. More inter-facial structures are sharper as the grid resolution increases.
Figure 6.
UNDEX near a free surface; density gradient contours at ms. Captured using CWENO4 schemes with different grids resolution. More inter-facial structures are sharper as the grid resolution increases.
Figure 11.
Computational domain setup for a two-dimensional underwater explosion near a planar rigid wall.
Figure 11.
Computational domain setup for a two-dimensional underwater explosion near a planar rigid wall.
Figure 12.
UNDEX near a rigid wall; the pressure contours at different instants. Captured using CWENO3 scheme with medium grid resolution. At very low pressure, cavitation can be noticed at time t = 4 ms and 5.3 ms near the rigid walls
Figure 12.
UNDEX near a rigid wall; the pressure contours at different instants. Captured using CWENO3 scheme with medium grid resolution. At very low pressure, cavitation can be noticed at time t = 4 ms and 5.3 ms near the rigid walls
Figure 13.
UNDEX near a rigid wall; plots of pressure history for the underwater explosion near a planar rigid wall at the center location of the upper wall obtained with CWENO4 schemes, and compared with other published results [
65,
77].
Figure 13.
UNDEX near a rigid wall; plots of pressure history for the underwater explosion near a planar rigid wall at the center location of the upper wall obtained with CWENO4 schemes, and compared with other published results [
65,
77].
Figure 14.
Computational domain setup for three-dimensional underwater explosion in a rigid cylinder.
Figure 14.
Computational domain setup for three-dimensional underwater explosion in a rigid cylinder.
Figure 15.
Underwater explosion in an enclosed cylindrical container; plots of pressure history (at the centre location of the left wall ) for the underwater explosion in an enclosed cylindrical wall with CWENO4 schemes, and compared with other published results. [
9,
81,
82]
Figure 15.
Underwater explosion in an enclosed cylindrical container; plots of pressure history (at the centre location of the left wall ) for the underwater explosion in an enclosed cylindrical wall with CWENO4 schemes, and compared with other published results. [
9,
81,
82]
Figure 16.
a. Mesh used for three-dimensional cylindrical underwater explosions. b. Corresponding mesh refinement for simulation zone.
Figure 16.
a. Mesh used for three-dimensional cylindrical underwater explosions. b. Corresponding mesh refinement for simulation zone.
Figure 17.
UNDEX in an enclosed cylindrical container; pressure gradient contours for the 3D underwater explosion in an enclosed, rigid cylindrical wall.
Figure 17.
UNDEX in an enclosed cylindrical container; pressure gradient contours for the 3D underwater explosion in an enclosed, rigid cylindrical wall.
Figure 20.
UNDEX of single bubble (top row) and two bubbles configurations placed horizontally near a free surface; contour of volume fraction using a CWENO4 scheme on a medium mesh at t=(0.2, 0.4, 0.8 and 1.2 ) ms (from left to right) and for inter-bubble lengths of (0.3, 0.5, 0.7 and 0.9) m from top to bottom respectively.
Figure 20.
UNDEX of single bubble (top row) and two bubbles configurations placed horizontally near a free surface; contour of volume fraction using a CWENO4 scheme on a medium mesh at t=(0.2, 0.4, 0.8 and 1.2 ) ms (from left to right) and for inter-bubble lengths of (0.3, 0.5, 0.7 and 0.9) m from top to bottom respectively.
Figure 21.
UNDEX of a single and two bubbles configurations placed horizontally near a free surface; contour of pressure gradient for the single bubble (Top) and the two-bubbles cases subsequently below for inter-bubble lengths of (0.3, 0.5, 0.7 and 0.9) m respectively using a CWENO4 scheme on a medium mesh at t=(0.4, 0.8 and 1.06 )ms. The red-yellow areas are cavitation zones.
Figure 21.
UNDEX of a single and two bubbles configurations placed horizontally near a free surface; contour of pressure gradient for the single bubble (Top) and the two-bubbles cases subsequently below for inter-bubble lengths of (0.3, 0.5, 0.7 and 0.9) m respectively using a CWENO4 scheme on a medium mesh at t=(0.4, 0.8 and 1.06 )ms. The red-yellow areas are cavitation zones.
Figure 22.
Computational domain setup for the three-dimensional underwater of two bubbles placed vertically in an enclosed region
Figure 22.
Computational domain setup for the three-dimensional underwater of two bubbles placed vertically in an enclosed region
Figure 25.
Underwater explosion of two bubbles vertically placed in an enclosed region; pressure gradient contours for the 3D underwater explosion in an enclosed rigid cylindrical wall with three different inter -bubble distances: = 15 mm(Top), 30 mm(Middle), 60 mm(Bottom) for varying time frames t = (1.54, 6, 30, 60 and 90) µs. Captured using CWENO4. The white-red-yellow areas are cavitation zones, the red regions are indicative of potential high cavitation activity.
Figure 25.
Underwater explosion of two bubbles vertically placed in an enclosed region; pressure gradient contours for the 3D underwater explosion in an enclosed rigid cylindrical wall with three different inter -bubble distances: = 15 mm(Top), 30 mm(Middle), 60 mm(Bottom) for varying time frames t = (1.54, 6, 30, 60 and 90) µs. Captured using CWENO4. The white-red-yellow areas are cavitation zones, the red regions are indicative of potential high cavitation activity.