Fluent Releases Version 6.0 of Its FLUENT Software

Fluent Inc., the world's leading CFD software provider, announces the release of FLUENT 6.0. This major new offering from Fluent is built on its robust and time-tested, unstructured CFD platform, with particularly notable leaps forward in the modeling of engineering problems involving multiphase physics, rotating equipment, and combustion. Highly advanced tools, which enable the user to create a moving/deforming mesh for analysis of in-cylinder engine performance, also make their debut as a beta capability in this version.

Lowest Cost-of-Ownership
Fluent's development team implemented a comprehensive testing program on this new version, to ensure that the release would have wide industrial applicability, right out of the box. "Each major new feature of FLUENT 6.0 went through a series of tests, culminating with at least one complex, real-world industrial problem, provided by a customer," says Fluent vice president Dr. Swaminathan Subbiah. "We know that when CFD users have to spend their time and effort to pre-validate and test their CFD software, the cost of CFD ownership goes up for them. We have largely eliminated the need for this type of second-guessing by doing the testing ahead of time, documenting it, and making it available to our users," he continues. "We offer FLUENT 6.0 to the market with great confidence that its new functionality will be widely applicable in an industrial setting."

"Fluent has entered into a league of their own with the release of FLUENT 6.0. In my testing efforts, I found that even when using the Eulerian-Eulerian model for complex geometries, along with FLUENT's fully unstructured code, the calculation time was substantially faster than FLUENT 4.5. In addition to these major enhancements, the code remains easy to use and continues to employ its intuitive setup," says M. Karim Essemiani of Vivendi Water.

CFD Firsts
FLUENT 6.0 sets the standard in certain areas of CFD modeling with capabilities new to the field, including the ability to use granular kinetic theory for Eulerian simulations on unstructured meshes. This capability is necessary to correctly predict the behavior of solids in multiphase flows. The formulation includes the solids pressure and can accurately describe transitions in the solids phase as the packing limit is reached. The Eulerian granular model is intended for applications such as fluidized beds, risers, solids suspension, and sedimentation. Three phase flows (gas-liquid-solids) can also be modeled using FLUENT 6.0. Another noteworthy CFD first is the capability of FLUENT 6.0 to postprocess results using turbomachinery-specific coordinates in its unstructured environment. This gives users modeling pumps, fans, blowers, and other rotating equipment the freedom to accurately model their geometry using an unstructured mesh without sacrificing the ability to examine meridional, pitchwise and spanwise cuts. A new eddy dissipation concept model, also an industry first, provides unique capabilities for pollutant formation analysis, such as NOx abatement studies. New spray models in FLUENT 6.0 include both primary and secondary atomization, and can be used in conjunction with liquid droplet combustion.

Parallel Processing
FLUENT's near-linear scaling during parallel processing has been head and shoulders above other general purpose CFD software, and this position is further advanced with the new version, where dynamic load balancing and other advanced features enable users to easily adapt FLUENT to a wide variety of multiprocessor configurations. The Microsoft Windows version of FLUENT has been integrated with MPI/Pro from MPI Software Technology Inc. MPI/Pro® is a commercial implementation of the MPI standard. FLUENT uses MPI to run in parallel on both compute clusters and multiprocessor machines.

Usability Enhancements
FLUENT 6.0 offers a new set of options for postprocessing and visualization, such as automatic generation of animations. Results can be output in VRML format, which enables the user to send three-dimensional images of results across the Web for remote viewing, where the receiver can change views, zoom in/out, and rotate the image.

"The VRML output in FLUENT 6.0 is a welcome new feature that will be important in our work. Additionally, the more advanced integration of visualization services and overall improved functionality make this code a perfect fit for our needs," says Paul Kingston of Hoare Lea Virtual Engineering.

Pricing and Availability
FLUENT 6.0 is available on UNIX, NT, and Linux platforms. It is provided at no additional cost to all current FLUENT users who have chosen to purchase upgrades along with their FLUENT license. FLUENT license fees are determined by the number of processes that a user requires. Users may also purchase unlimited usage support.