10th December 2014

OpenFOAM 2.3.1 Released

The OpenFOAM Foundation is pleased to announce the release of version 2.3.1 of the OpenFOAM open source CFD toolbox. The release coincides with the 10th Anniversary of the first release of OpenFOAM (version 1.0) by the project founders: Henry Weller, Chris Greenshields and Mattijs Janssens.

Version 2.3.1 consolidates the major version 2.3.0 release through a large number of bug fixes and code improvements, included in over 400 code commits and over 800 file changes. OpenFOAM v2.3.1 is distributed under the General Public Licence by the OpenFOAM Foundation as:

Deb packs created for Ubuntu Linux;
source code for compilation on other Linux systems.

Version 2.3.1 also contains small, new developments, some of which are listed below. See the version 2.3.0 release announcement for information about the new features in the 2.3 series of OpenFOAM software.

Pre-processing

A new fixedNormalInletOutletVelocity boundary condition (BC) has been added in 2.3.1; the pressureInletOutletVelocity BC now optionally includes a specified tangential component for velocity.

Meshing

snappyHexMesh includes some feature enhancements including allowing empty refinement surfaces and improved feature refinement with parallel running; a new searchableSurface has been introduced called searchableDisk, which defines a circular disk by origin, normal and radius; the Bspline functionality has been reintroduced to blockMesh.

Thermophysical modelling

Support has been added for PengRobinsonGas equation of state.

Turbulence modelling

The kOmegaSST model has been upgraded and support for multiphase operation has been included in the buoyantKEpsilon and continuousGasKEpsilon models.

Multiphase modelling

The twoPhaseEulerFoam multiphase solver has been rewritten to be fully conservative in mass, momentum and energy. This development required additions to fvmDdt/fvcDdt to support time derivatives of triples, e.g. $∂(αρU )∕ ∂t \relax \special {t4ht=$ . Conservation requires convergence of the equation system, so ‘PIMPLE’ outer correctors have been introduced to the tutorial examples.
The driftFluxFoam solver has now replaced settlingFoam, providing the functionality of settlingFoam and more, with the modelling written using OpenFOAM’s standard run-time selection mechanism and including multiple reference frames (MRF).
A dynamic mesh potentialFreeSurfaceDyMFoam solver has been introduced with accompanying oscillatingBox tutorial.

Particle methods

Improvements have been incorporated to deal with ‘stuck’ particles and a new Lagrangian turbulence library has been created for the new turbulence modelling structure.

Post-processing

A new vorticity function object has been added in this release.

Other

The run-time code compilation, e.g. using the the #codeStream directive, and systemCall function object are now activated by default in 2.3.1; they can be deactivated by setting allowSystemOperations switch off (= 0) in the global controlDict file in the etc directory of the OpenFOAM installation.

OpenFOAM v2.3.1 was produced by Henry Weller, Chris Greenshields, Mattijs Janssens, Andy Heather, William Bainbridge and Sergio Ferraris. Thanks to the OpenFOAM enthusiasts who have contributed to a better code through the bug reporting system.

To download OpenFOAM 2.3.1, click here.