Boundary element method for thermal flows using k-epsilon turbulence models

Purpose - This paper aims to develop a multidomain boundary element method (BEM) for modeling 2D complex turbulent thermal flow using low Reynolds two-equation turbulence models. Design/methodology/approach - The integral boundary domain equations are discretised using mixed boundary elements and a multidomain method also known as a subdomain technique. The resulting system matrix is an overdetermined, sparse block banded and solved using a fast iterative linear least squares solver. Findings - The simulation of a turbulent flow over a backward step is in excellent agreement with the finite volume method using the same turbulent model. A grid consisting of over 100,000 elements could be solved in the order of a few minutes using a 3.0 GhzP4 and 1 GB memory indicating good efficiency. Originality/value - The paper shows, for the first time, that the BEM is applicable to thermal flows using k-▫$epsilon$▫