Research Fellows
Ilias Vasilopoulos
Early Stage Researcher 11 at Rolls-Royce Deutschland
Regarding CAD-free optimization, the simple node-based approach was selected in this work for the parameterization. In this approach, every node of the surface CFD mesh that lies on the model’s surface is treated as a design parameter and can move independently in the normal direction. Surface regularization was achieved through implicit smoothing (tool developed by ESR 4) of the adjoint surface sensitivities, and the resulting smoothed sensitivities were translated to surface displacements using a steepest descent optimizer. The RRD in-house mesh morpher which uses the linear elasticity technique was employed to propagate these displacements into the CFD domain and update the volume mesh. The whole process, outlined in the figure below, was wrapped in Python and its application was demonstrated on the TU Berlin Stator case (deliverable 77 D6.13). The manufacturing constraints of the case were not included in this optimization due to the difficulties that arise from their imposition on a node-based level. Finding a solution to this known problem would make this approach more appealing within an industrial environment.
