Computational Engineering for Wind–Exposed Thin–Walled Structures

Abstract

In this paper a computer-aided simulation approach for fluid-structure interaction of wind-exposed structures is presented. In the center of our software architecture is the geometric model of the structure, from which a finite element mesh for the structure and a finite volume mesh for the fluid are derived. The attention is concentrated to thin-walled structures like membranes and thin shells composed of light and flexible materials. The interaction of fluid and structure is effected by wind-induced vibrations and causes large elastic deformations of the structure. A powerful simulation tool is provided by coupling two codes developed for flow simulation and structural dynamics by a fully implicit coupling algorithm. Results of three-dimensional simulations of fluid-structure interaction for several test cases as well as for a real-life example will be presented.