Development of an unstructured radiation model applicable for two-dimensional planar, axisymmetric, and three-dimensional geometries

An unstructured finite volume method for radiative heat transfer has been d eveloped and they are applicable for any 2D planar, axisymmetric, or 3D pro blems with structured, unstructured, or hybrid grids. The angular domain is discretized by either the Sn-type discretization strategy or the azimuthal discretization strategy. For a 2D axisymmetric problem, the artifice devel oped by Carlson and Lathrop has been employed to treat the angular derivati ve terms, and a general formulation for the curvature coefficients of angul ar redistribution alpha(m+/-1/2) has been subsequently developed. In order to validate the developed unstructured method, six benchmark problems with a wide range of conditions have been examined. The grids considered for eac h problem include a structured grid and an unstructured grid. The solutions based on the present unstructured method are very close for structured and unstructured grids and they all have a very good agreement with available other solutions. The present study indicates that not only is the developed unstructured radiation model flexible in treating problems with complicate d geometries but also it is very accurate and efficient. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.