COMSOL: 2D Cable Heat Transfer Simulation

[gl-l]

Hi, I am working on a simple 2D simulation, that aims to simulate the heat transfer in a cable from the core to the insulation.

Here is a screenshot of my overall setup:

My main problem is, that I can not get a current to simulate correctly without the addition of a ground boundary. The ground boundary is currently set as seen below:

This does not really mimic the real life setup, as the ground would not be present.
Is there a way for me to simulate the heat transfer without including a ground boundary?

Currently the study is set as a stationary study, but when this works the plan is to expand to a time dependent study.

Thanks for the help in advance

 

[FEA way]

Check Comsol’s blog article titled "How to Model the Electromagnetic Heating of Underground Cables". You could also avoid modeling the electrical part of this multiphysics problem and just apply a proper heat source resulting from Joule heating unless you have to account for the coupled phenomena.

 

[NRP99]

Check this example on youtube - COMSOL Conduction heat transfer EXAMPLE 3–9 Heat Loss from an Insulated Electric Wire

No ground boundary is used. Only heat convection boundary is used. But heat source condition is applied on wire which is modeled in this example. If you do not want to model electric wire then you need to apply heat flux/heat source condition which the current and voltage is producing.