Steam Methane Reforming (SMR) Reactor — ANSYS Fluent CFD SimulationDescriptionThis project presents a CFD simulation of Steam Methane Reforming (SMR), the most widely used industrial route for producing hydrogen from hydrocarbon fuels. In an SMR plant, methane reacts with steam over a catalyst to produce hydrogen, carbon monoxide, and carbon dioxide through a series of endothermic reactions, with the necessary heat supplied by a burner in a surrounding heating chamber. In this project, you'll model a sleeve-type SMR reactor — capturing both the catalytic reforming reactions inside the tubes and the combustion that supplies their heat — a genuine multi-physics chemical-engineering problem. Within the Reacting Flow: Beginner CFD Training Package, this project moves beyond pure combustion into industrial reacting flow, coupling catalytic chemistry with the combustion that drives it.MethodologyThe SMR plant geometry — a heating chamber plus reforming tubes — is designed in Design Modeler and meshed with a large unstructured grid of roughly 1.65 million elements for the complex multi-zone reactor. The Species Transport model is set up to track multiple chemical species (H₂, CO, CO₂, CH₄, O₂), with multiple volumetric reactions defined — three reforming reactions inside the tubes and one combustion reaction in the thermal chamber. A porous medium is modeled as the catalyst inside the reforming tubes, coupling the reacting flow with porous-zone behavior. The setup handles the endothermic reforming reactions and the heat coupling between the burner and the reforming tubes, so the combustion heat drives the hydrogen-producing chemistry inside the tubes.AnalysisPost-processing focuses on the mass-fraction contours of each species, verifying methane consumption and hydrogen production and confirming that the reactor is operating correctly. From these fields you can follow how the reforming reactions convert methane and steam into hydrogen along the tubes, and how the combustion in the surrounding chamber supplies the heat that sustains them. Hydrogen is central to clean energy, ammonia synthesis, and refining, and the skills developed here — multi-reaction Species Transport coupled with catalytic porous zones — transfer directly to catalytic converters, fuel reformers, chemical reactors, and combustion systems across the process industries. By the end of this project, you'll be able to set up a multi-reaction Species Transport model, couple reacting flow with a catalytic porous zone, handle endothermic reactions with burner heat coupling, and interpret species contours to evaluate reactor performance.

DescriptionThis tutorial presents a CFD analysis of a 2-D gas turbine combustion chamber using ANSYS Fluent.A gas turbine is a rotating machine driven by the energy released during combustion. It consists of three main components: a compressor that pressurizes incoming air, a combustion chamber where fuel and air mix and ignite, and a turbine that converts the energy of the hot, expanding gases into mechanical work. Part of this mechanical output drives the compressor itself, while the remainder powers the generator in turbo-generator setups, provides thrust in turbojet and turbofan engines, or serves other applications depending on the turbine's design.The fuel delivery system is one of the most actively developed areas of gas turbine design, with injectors playing a central role in achieving efficient combustion. This project models the combustion of a methane-air mixture inside the chamber, with methane and oxygen entering at velocities of 128.9304 m/s and 12.0396 m/s, and temperatures of 286 K and 109 K, respectively. The resulting mixture ignites, releasing energy and generating heat throughout the domain.The geometry was created in Design Modeler and discretized using ANSYS Meshing, producing a structured mesh of 197,006 cells.MethodologySince the simulation involves multiple chemical species, the Species Transport model is employed to solve the transport equations for each species, while a volumetric reaction defines the combustion process. The Eddy-Dissipation model captures the interaction between turbulence and chemical kinetics, and the real gas equation accounts for density variations of the vapor phase with temperature.ResultsThe simulation outputs contours of temperature, velocity, pressure, and species mass fractions throughout the combustion chamber, confirming that the combustion reaction proceeds as expected. Concentrations of the oxidizer and fuel are highest near the inlet and decrease progressively as they are consumed in the reaction, while combustion products such as H₂O and CO start at zero and increase steadily along the chamber. As the reaction is exothermic, it releases substantial heat, driving a marked rise in chamber temperature.

Diesel Fuel Combustion in a Gas Turbine Combustion Chamber — ANSYS Fluent CFD Simulation TrainingThis project simulates the combustion of diesel fuel inside the combustion chamber of a gas turbine system using ANSYS Fluent, with the full case analyzed through CFD post-processing.The combustion chamber works as follows: air enters from the space surrounding the chamber, passes through a bladed diffuser duct where it becomes turbulent, and then enters the dedicated combustion space to mix more effectively with the fuel. The fuel, meanwhile, is injected into the chamber through a nozzle and mixes with the incoming air, allowing combustion to take place. The fuel used is diesel (C₁₆H₂₉), which reacts with the airflow.The combustion reaction involves four species — diesel, hydrogen, oxygen, and carbon — so the Species Transport model is used to define the gaseous species, together with the volumetric reaction model to govern the reaction between them. Air enters the chamber at a velocity of 3 m/s and a temperature of 300 K, while diesel is sprayed into the chamber interior at 4 m/s and 300 K. The aim of the study is to investigate the mass fractions of the reactants and the combustion products.The 3D geometry was created in Design Modeler and meshed in ANSYS Meshing using an unstructured grid, for a total of 3,488,057 cells.MethodologyThe Species Transport model is used to analyze the combustion process, and the energy equation is activated to compute the temperature changes throughout the domain.ResultsOnce the solution is complete, 2D and 3D contours of pressure, temperature, velocity, and the mass fractions of diesel, oxygen, carbon dioxide, and water vapor are obtained.The contours show that the fuel mixes well with the oxidizer and that combustion takes place, with its products clearly visible. The temperature is very high in parts of the combustion chamber, and the results show that the combustion flame is well formed.

Vortex Flame Combustion Chamber, 4-Inlet (Methane and Air) — ANSYS Fluent CFD Simulation TrainingThis project simulates the vortex flame inside a combustion chamber using ANSYS Fluent, with the full case analyzed through CFD post-processing.The geometry is a three-dimensional cylindrical combustion chamber built in Design Modeler. Air enters through four inlet sections arranged radially around the chamber, while fuel enters through four inlet sections positioned axially at the top. A single outlet at the bottom of the chamber discharges the combustion products.The mesh was generated in ANSYS Meshing using a structured grid, with a total of 725,521 elements.MethodologyThe chamber has a cylindrical structure in which the reactants — fuel and air — enter separately through four inlets in the upper region, and the reaction products exit from the bottom.Air enters radially through four inlets spaced 90 degrees apart around the outer circumference of the chamber, while methane is injected directly into the chamber interior through the remaining four inlets. This arrangement establishes the swirling, vortex-shaped flame at the heart of the model.The chemical reaction between air and methane is modeled with the Species Transport model, involving five species: O₂, N₂, CH₄, CO₂, and H₂O. The incoming air contains a mass fraction of 0.23 oxygen, with a flow rate of 0.001135845 kg/s at 300 K. The fuel enters simultaneously at a flow rate of 0.0000645 kg/s, also at 300 K.The outer wall is treated as a convective boundary exchanging heat with the surroundings, with an ambient (free-stream) temperature of 300 K and a heat transfer coefficient of 25 W/m²·K.The RNG k-epsilon turbulence model and the energy equation are both activated to resolve the turbulent flow field and compute the temperature distribution throughout the domain.ResultsThe solution yields 2D and 3D contours of pressure, temperature, velocity, and the mass fractions of O₂, CH₄, H₂O, CO₂, and N₂.The contours show that as combustion takes place between fuel and air, temperature rises sharply near the chamber inlets. As the reaction proceeds, the methane mass fraction decreases while the mass fractions of the combustion products — CO₂ and H₂O — increase accordingly.

DescriptionThis project simulates combustion in a gas flare system using ANSYS Fluent, investigated through CFD analysis. The model was built in 3D using Design Modeler. Owing to the symmetrical structure of the flare and to reduce computational cost, only a 120-degree segment of the geometry was modeled.The flare has a cylindrical structure situated within a cylindrical computational domain. Several distinct sections — steam, gas flow, and pilot — are defined at the tip of the flare. Meshing was performed in ANSYS Meshing, producing 1,043,138 elements.MethodologyA flare system, or gas flare, is a combustion device used in industrial facilities such as oil and gas refineries and at oil and gas production wells, particularly on offshore platforms, to safely burn off surplus hydrocarbon gases. The Species Transport model was used to carry out this simulation.The reacting mixture is defined as an n-butane–air blend consisting of nine gaseous species: C₄H₁₀, O₂, CO₂, H₂O, H₂, CH₄, C₂H₆, C₃H₈, and N₂. The volumetric reaction model was activated to enable the chemical reactions and, in turn, the combustion process, which is represented by five distinct chemical reactions.At the flare tip, a stream of hydrocarbon gas enters the environment at a flow rate of 0.09259 kg/s. Simultaneously, a methane flow from the pilot and a steam flow from the steam inlet — both at velocities of 2.479 m/s — enter the domain to ignite the mixture. The standard k-epsilon model was used to solve the turbulent flow equations, together with the energy equation to compute the temperature variation within the combustion region.ConclusionOn completion of the solution, three-dimensional contours of velocity and of the mass fraction of each modeled gas species were obtained.For instance, examining the three-dimensional contour of carbon dioxide clearly shows that the combustion reaction and the resulting production of CO₂ are taking place. As the results also demonstrate, the mass fractions of the fuel species decrease with distance from the fuel inlet, while the mass fractions of the reaction products correspondingly increase along the same direction — confirming the progress of combustion through the domain.

Gas Flare, Two-Step Air–Methane Mechanism Combustion, ANSYS Fluent CFD Simulation TutorialDescriptionThis project simulates combustion in a gas flare, using a two-step methane–air mechanism, in the presence of a crosswind, with ANSYS Fluent.This case is a clear example of a reacting flow, where the fluid motion and the chemistry are solved together: the flow carries fuel and air into the flame, the combustion reactions release heat and change the gas composition, and the resulting temperature and density fields feed back into the flow. Modeling this coupling is exactly what the reacting-flow (species transport) approach is built for.A gas flare is a combustion device used in industrial facilities such as oil and gas refineries and at production wells, particularly on offshore platforms, to safely burn off natural gas.The 3-D geometry was built in Design Modeler. Because the flare is symmetric, only half of it is modeled to cut the computational cost, with a symmetry boundary condition applied. The flare has a cylindrical body with four outlet ducts and sits inside a computational domain that carries the wind flow; this domain is likewise halved along the symmetry plane. The model was meshed in ANSYS Meshing with 1,546,925 elements.Simulation MethodologyGas flares burn the natural gas released during oil extraction. During extraction, natural gas accumulates above the oil in the reservoir. Collecting and storing this gas is preferable, but where that is not possible it is flared. Burning the gas in a flare avoids uncontrolled, hazardous release, and converting methane to carbon dioxide before it reaches the atmosphere is less harmful than releasing the methane directly.To capture the chemistry, the species transport model is used with volumetric reactions enabled, and the eddy-dissipation model estimates the reaction rate. A methane–air mixture burns through a two-step mechanism: first methane and oxygen react to form carbon monoxide (and water), then the carbon monoxide combines with oxygen to form carbon dioxide. Air enters the domain at 0.2 m/s and 300 K, and the fuel enters at 0.1 m/s and 300 K. The realizable k-ε model and the energy equation are enabled to solve the turbulent flow and compute the temperature distribution.Results & ConclusionAfter solving, two- and three-dimensional contours of pressure, temperature, velocity, and the mass fraction of each modeled species were obtained, with the two-dimensional contours shown on the geometry's symmetry plane.The species mass-fraction contours confirm that the reaction takes place: the carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide contours show these products being generated, while the methane contour shows the hydrocarbon being consumed as the reactant. The contours also show that the crosswind carries the combustion products, such as carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide, away from the flare and disperses them into the surrounding environment.

Explosion — ANSYS Fluent CFD SimulationDescriptionThis project presents a CFD simulation of a TNT explosion — a problem central to engineering safety, military applications, structural protection, and blast planning. An explosion is a very fast exothermic reaction that suddenly produces large volumes of hot gaseous products, spiking pressure and temperature and launching compression waves that travel outward through the surrounding air. In this project, you'll model the rapid decomposition of TNT — where 2 moles of TNT generate 22 moles of gaseous products — and watch the resulting spherical pressure wave propagate and dissipate across the domain. Within the Reacting Flow: Beginner CFD Training Package, this project applies reacting-flow modeling to a blast event, introducing the transient wave propagation that defines explosion physics.MethodologyThe domain is a half-sphere of 5 m radius with a central TNT charge (a 5 cm radius half-sphere), built in SpaceClaim using symmetry to reduce cost, and meshed with a large structured grid of roughly 2.67 million elements capable of resolving a traveling wave. Because the problem involves moving pressure waves, a transient solver is required. The Species Transport model is set up with a defined species mixture and a volume reaction, with finite-rate turbulence–chemistry interaction and the direct source chemistry solver. The Realizable k-ε turbulence model is applied with the energy equation activated. A critical modeling choice is defining the mixture density as an ideal gas, which is what allows the simulation to capture the wave travel through the domain.AnalysisPost-processing produces temperature and pressure contours over time, along with an animation of the propagating compression wave, and quantifies the wave speed at roughly 420 m/s. From these results you can follow how the rapid exothermic reaction spikes the pressure and temperature at the charge and launches the spherical compression wave that travels outward and dissipates across the domain. Blast modeling protects buildings, vehicles, and people, and the reacting-flow + ideal-gas + transient workflow built here transfers directly to detonations, deflagrations, gas explosions, and pressure-vessel safety analysis across defense, oil and gas, and process industries. By the end of this project, you'll be able to set up a transient reacting-flow explosion simulation, configure the Species Transport model with a volume reaction and finite-rate chemistry, apply the ideal-gas density needed to capture wave propagation, and interpret the pressure and temperature fields of a blast wave.

Shell and Tube Heat Exchanger with Helical Fin and Nanofluid — ANSYS Fluent CFD SimulationDescriptionThis project simulates heat transfer in a shell-and-tube heat exchanger enhanced by two techniques at once: helical fins in the shell and an Al₂O₃–water nanofluid as the working fluid. Shell-and-tube exchangers are among the most widely used heat-transfer devices in industry — one stream flows through the tubes, the other through the shell. Adding helical fins forces the shell-side fluid along a longer, swirling path, increasing its contact time with the tube surfaces, while the nanofluid raises the fluid's effective thermal conductivity. Together they target the same goal: a higher heat-transfer rate without enlarging the device. Within the Nanofluid: Beginner CFD Training Package, this project applies nanofluid to a real industrial heat exchanger and introduces the efficient single-phase property-correlation approach to nanofluid modeling.MethodologyThe key modeling decision is how to represent the nanofluid. Two approaches exist: a full multiphase model (base fluid plus dispersed nanoparticles), which is physically detailed but computationally expensive; or the single-phase property approach, where the nanofluid's density, specific heat, thermal conductivity, and viscosity are computed from established mixture correlations using the base-fluid and nanoparticle properties. This project uses the second method — accurate for thermal performance and far more efficient, which is the standard industrial choice for this type of study. The geometry is built in Design Modeler and meshed in ANSYS Meshing as an unstructured mesh wrapping around the tube bundle and helical-fin geometry, with the Al₂O₃–water nanofluid properties assigned from the mixture correlations.AnalysisThe results provide contours of temperature, velocity, and pressure through the exchanger. The temperature field maps the heat transfer along the shell side clearly, and the results confirm the design intent — both the nanofluid and the helical fins enhance heat transfer compared with a plain fluid and a finless shell, by raising conductivity and lengthening the shell-side flow path respectively. By the end of this project, you'll be able to model a nanofluid efficiently via the single-phase property-correlation method, set up a finned shell-and-tube exchanger, and evaluate heat-transfer enhancement from the temperature, velocity, and pressure fields.

Heat Exchanger with Baffle Cut and Mixture Nanofluid — ANSYS Fluent CFD SimulationDescriptionThis project presents a CFD investigation of the combined effects of baffle configuration and nanofluid application on shell-and-tube heat exchanger performance. The simulation examines a shell-and-tube exchanger incorporating two heat-transfer-enhancement techniques at once: strategic baffle placement and an Al₂O₃–water nanofluid as the working medium. The nanofluid improves thermal performance by raising the effective thermal conductivity without a significant viscosity penalty, while the baffles create beneficial flow patterns and extend the shell-side flow path — together achieving superior heat transfer while maintaining acceptable hydraulic performance. Within the Nanofluid: Beginner CFD Training Package, this project combines the mixture nanofluid model with baffle-cut geometry, building on the earlier heat-exchanger cases toward more advanced enhancement strategies.MethodologyThe heat exchanger has a shell of 1 m diameter and 4.5 m length, carrying the Al₂O₃–water nanofluid as the cold shell-side stream, with water as the hot tube-side stream through 0.15 m diameter tubes of 3 m active length. Four baffles of 0.7 m length are arranged on the shell side, with 0.15 m shell-side and 0.3 m tube-side connection nozzles. The domain — shell-side flow path with baffles, tube-side flow path, and solid tube walls — is meshed in ANSYS Meshing with 450,980 elements, with fluid–solid interfaces defined for conjugate heat transfer. The nanofluid is modeled with the Mixture multiphase model, with water as the continuous phase and Al₂O₃ particles as the dispersed phase, capturing interphase drag, particle distribution, and thermal effects. The Al₂O₃ nanoparticles have a thermal conductivity of 40 W/m·K and a density of 3970 kg/m³, with effective properties calculated from mixture theory. A pressure-based coupled solver is used with second-order discretization, the k-ε turbulence model with standard wall functions, and a steady-state solution.AnalysisThe results are visualized through temperature contours that reveal the thermal gradients and quantify the heat-transfer enhancement over conventional fluids, isolating the contribution of the nanofluid's raised thermal conductivity. Streamline analysis shows the complex flow patterns induced by the baffles, identifying recirculation zones that promote mixing and the flow acceleration in the baffle-restricted areas. Together these clarify how the baffles and nanofluid enhance heat transfer synergistically — beyond what either could achieve alone. From these results you can draw design guidance on optimal baffle placement with nanofluids and on balancing thermal enhancement against pumping power. By the end of this project, you'll be able to set up a shell-and-tube exchanger with baffles, model a nanofluid with the Mixture multiphase model and conjugate heat transfer, and evaluate the combined heat-transfer enhancement from the temperature and flow fields.

Twisted Tape Inserts and Vortex Generators in Heat Exchanger — ANSYS Fluent CFD SimulationDescriptionThis project investigates heat-transfer enhancement in a tubular heat exchanger using CFD, with nanofluid flow as the central modeling theme. The working medium in the inner tube is a hot alumina (Al₂O₃) nanofluid — a base liquid carrying suspended nanoparticles that raise its effective thermal conductivity and alter its flow and heat-transfer behavior relative to a conventional fluid. Treating this medium correctly is the core of the study, and it is combined with two passive enhancement devices — twisted-tape inserts and vortex generators — to examine how geometry and nanofluid properties together govern thermal performance. Enhancing heat transfer in tubular exchangers matters across many industrial processes, where higher thermal efficiency translates directly into energy and cost savings. Within the Nanofluid: Beginner CFD Training Package, this project combines nanofluid with passive turbulence-promoting geometry, building on the finned heat-exchanger case toward more complex enhancement techniques.MethodologyThe configuration has two sections: an inner passage carrying the hot alumina nanofluid and an outer passage carrying ambient air. As the nanofluid flows through the inner tube while the cooler air passes through the outer section, heat is transferred from the nanofluid to the air, and the simulation captures this cooling process and its effect on overall efficiency — with the specific aim of assessing how the twisted-tape inserts and vortex generators reshape the flow patterns, heat-transfer characteristics, and pressure drop. The geometry was created in ANSYS Design Modeler and meshed in ANSYS Meshing with 4,427,809 elements. The simulation uses a pressure-based solver, appropriate for the incompressible flow typical of heat-exchanger applications, with a steady-state approach representing continuous operation under constant flow conditions. The RNG k-ε turbulence model is applied to capture the complex swirling and recirculating flow created by the inserts, and the energy equation is enabled to resolve the temperature field and heat transfer throughout the system.AnalysisThe results give a detailed picture of the coupled flow and thermal behavior. The pressure field shows high pressure near the vortex generators and low pressure in the core flow, ranging from about −544.64 Pa to 1960.45 Pa, with an area-weighted average static pressure of 1953.92 Pa at the gas inlet and 206.98 Pa at the nanofluid inlet and both outlets at atmospheric pressure. The temperature field clearly shows the cooling of the nanofluid as it traverses the tube, falling from 353.15 K at the inlet to 352.50 K at the outlet, while the air rises from 298.15 K to 323.31 K as it absorbs the transferred heat. The velocity pathlines and contours reveal the complex flow induced by the geometry: the flow accelerates through the twisted-tape and vortex-generator regions, reaching velocities up to 0.5 m/s, and the twisted tape imposes a swirling motion that intensifies mixing and heat transfer. The turbulent kinetic energy peaks near the vortex generators and in their wakes, reaching up to 72.69 m²/s², driving the enhanced mixing in those regions. Taken together, the results demonstrate the strong interplay between fluid flow and heat transfer: the inserts and vortex generators create regions of high velocity and turbulence that directly enhance the cooling of the nanofluid. By the end of this project, you'll be able to represent a nanofluid working medium combined with passive turbulence-promoting geometry, apply the RNG k-ε model to capture insert-induced swirl, and evaluate thermal performance from the temperature, velocity, pressure, and turbulence fields.