Unsteady cavitating flow - A new cavitation model based on a modified front capturing method and bubble dynamics

This paper presents a numerical approach for a new cavitation model that bases on a combination of the Volume-of-Fluid (VOF) technique with a model predicting the growth and collapse process of bubbles. This process leads to a time dependent vapor distribution in the computational domain and is modeled by the inclusion of a vapor source term in the void fraction transport equation. The cavitation model is applied for the simulation of cavitating nozzle flows and cavitating flow over a NACA 0015 hydrofoil and showed it's capability to resolve characteristic effects of cavitation such as the cyclic formation of the cavitation cloud, the formation of the re-entrant jet and the local occurrence of hydrodynamic pressure peaks due to bubble cloud collapse.