Generally, numerical simulation of flows provides decision assistance elements: for design, dimensioning, prediction of operation. It has become very reliable because it is based on theoretical foundations and models perfected after basic physical experiments and validations under realistic operating conditions.
These simulations, representing reality as much as possible, in turn generate a complement to the experimental approach. The matter can be probed at any point at any time and any quantity can be checked, regardless of temperature, pressure and other conditions, of course provided that we are in the computation domain. Numerical simulation has thus become an aid to understanding physics, with enhanced usefulness insofar as the phenomena are inaccessible to measurement and observation.
This example of the instabilities of the flow in a launch vehicle nozzle in operation gives us a real introspection into the fluid, made possible by the mastery of the physics and the simulation program. The last step, visualization, gives access to all the quantities desired for interpretation at any point. An experimenter's dream: a non-intrusive and thus non-disturbing method that makes it possible to grasp all the details of an experiment in as hostile as possible a medium.
Simulation: Sébastien Deck, researcher in the Applied Aerodynamics Department
Visualization : Magali Dodemant, intern
Texts : Sébastien Deck , Sylvain Gaultier - COM
