Simple CFD tool. "Fake CFD"

[Didro]

Hello,

I need to simulate a flowing of substance, but I needn't(and can't) do it in right (completely physical-proved) way. My system will being used as education system, so I can do some fakes in simulation process.

Examples of flowing of substance\energy, that I need to simulate: flowing of smoke\dust\..., expansion of noise, propagation of explosive wave, heat conduction, etc.

Again, I do not simulate the real physical process, I can do it approximately(to get students only common understanding of the real process, to illustrate the process).

So I'm seeking for the convenient middleware or engine to solve my task. I glance over the CFD-Online(

http://www.cfd-online.com)

links(both software and libs), but don't find anythink suitable for my task.

For example for particle modelling I intend to use Particle System API(

http://www.particlesystems.org).

May be this lib don't modelling particles' dynamic properly in terms of physics, but it suits me.

Is there anythink like that in CFD systems area? So called, CFD fake tool Could anybody advises me such a tool?

Thank you.

 

[btrueblood]

What are you teaching - how to fake a CFD analysis?

 

[Didro]

>>What are you teaching - how to fake a CFD analysis?

in short - no. Our course is devoted to life safety systems. And in large part of course we tell about and deal with security facilities and safeguarding equipment. So we want to simulate influences on people by environment (noise, gas, temperature coercion, electromagnetic influence, etc.), which might be a "target" for safeguarding equipment.(From which safeguarding equipment must protect us).
Of course we would like use fullblown CFD-system, but I think in our case such system would be too complicated. For now we don't want to design and construct( new equipment(may be we do that in future).

Now I see four ways to achieve my goal (to create such CFD-fake system):

1. Investigate algorithms utilized in game development (for example game

http://www.plasmapong.com

show us, that there are some methods in gamedev to achieve realistic fluid dynamic.

2. Try to simulate fluid dynamic by cellurar automates(CA)

3. Try to use particles (e.g.

http://www.particlesystems.org)

to simulate fluid dynamics (also there is some papers in net)

4. Try to find simple method of roughly solving real CFD problem (probably it is impossible to find such method)

 

[tkordyban]

It sounds like you don't necessarily need to "solve" the flow. You already know what the flow is supposed to look like. You just want to illustrate it for a class. Maybe what you really want is an animation program. If you can draw simple diagrams on the computer, you can draw in the "particles" yourself, and move them from frame to frame. You would be surprised how realistic a flow can look with only 10 or 20 frames of animation repeated over and over. If a low-cost animation program might help, I'd recommend Paint Shop Pro from Corel. You can get a free demo from their web site. It's a lot cheaper than any true CFD program, and a lot easier to learn.

 

[Didro]

Thank you for your answer.
I've thought about using of simple animation, and last year my group had done animation of particles in Alias Wavefront's(now Autodesk's) Maya editor - it looks very realistic, as you've said.
As from now, I want to add a bit more interactivity in course, for example let students to transfer(move,rotate) protection equipments (for example noise barrier), or to change the material of which it consist.
So I'll follow your advise and will use animation to illustrate the fluid dynamic for class, but now I want more