Large-Eddy Simulation of Three-Dimensional Turbulent Free Surface Flow Past a Complex Stream Restoration Structure

Large-eddy simulation (LES) of a three-dimensional, turbulent free surface flow past a stream restoration structure with arbitrarily complex geometries is presented. The three-dimensional, incompressible, spatially filtered Navier-Stokes and continuity equations are solved in generalized curvilinear coordinates. For the solution of mixed air-water flows, the curvilinear immersed boundary (CURVIB)-level set method developed previously is used and extended to carry out LES. Complex solid geometries are handled by the sharp-interface CURVIB method, and the subgrid scale stress terms arising from the spatial filtering of the Navier-Stokes equations are closed by the dynamic Smagorinsky model. To demonstrate the potential of the CURVIB-LES-level set model for simulating real-life, turbulent free surface flows involving arbitrarily complex geometries, LES is carried out for the flow past a complex rock structure that is fully submerged in water in a laboratory flume. The simulations show that the method is able to predict the time-averaged value as well as the root-mean-square fluctuations of water surfaces with good accuracy. Moreover, it is seen that the free surface flow at a high Froude number causes a significant level of fluctuations of water surface elevation and velocity at the water surface. (C) 2015 American Society of Civil Engineers.