A new second-moment closure approach for turbulent swirling confined flows

An improved anisotropic model for the dissipation rate-epsilon-of the turbulent kinetic energy (k), to be used together with a non-linear pressure-strain cotrelations model, is proposed. Experimental data from the open literature for two confined turbulent swirling flows are used to assess the performance of the proposed model in comparison to the standard epsilon transport equation and to a linear approach to model the pressure-strain term that appears in the exact equations for the Reynolds-stress tensor. For the less strongly swirling flow the predictions show much more sensitivity to the epsilon transport equation than to the pressure-strain model. In opposition, for the more strongly swirling flow, the results show that the predictions are much sensitive to the pressure-strain model. Nevertheless, the improved epsilon transport equation together with the non-linear pressure strain model yield predictions in good agreement with experiments in both studied cases. (C) Copyright 2003 John Wiley Sons, Ltd.