FDS automated meshing tool
When performing FDS simulations two main problems arise: mesh partitioning and optimal deployment of computational resources. The optimal meshing strategy is the one that allows to redistribute efficiently the computer’s resources while minimising the calculation time. This is achieved by dividing big meshes into smaller ones and running a simulation in parallel mode, but how can it be done in practice?
A practical solution is provided by the FireWorkBench mesh cutter. Given an uncut set of meshes, it allows to automatically optimise the meshing strategy just by setting the number of available processes. Based on the size of each mesh, these will be split into smaller ones or grouped together in order to balance the computational load and speed up the calculation. No extra steps are required to the user, such as choosing the number of partitions for the single mesh or the process which they should be assigned to. The result is an FDS input file which can be directly embedded in the original input file ready to run.?
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Each simulation and each computer are different so the choice of the number of processes or the optimal meshing strategy might not be straightforward. The FireWorkBench mesh cutter offers an additional feature that allows you to find the optimal number of processes that should be used to run your specific simulation on your specific machine. By testing different meshing strategies on a reduced case it is possible to find out which one runs faster and should be later used for the final simulation. This optimization can be done both on your personal computer for some smaller simulations or on a big cluster that is often used for larger and longer analyses. FDS runs on different operating systems so this feature was developed for both Windows and Linux and it doesn’t require installing any additional packages.
The FireWorkBench mesh cutter helps you speed up the preparation of your analysis and minimise the run time of the simulation, keeping your project on track and your boss a bit more relaxed.
You can test our first version of the FireWorkBench mesh cutter at this link (FireWorkBench) after registering (we only need your email address and we will never spam you or give your data to anyone) and we are looking forward to receiving your feedback and comments.
Specialist Engineer Tunnel Safety at Sweco
2 年Thanks to the comments and the suggestions I received, I was able to spot some bugs in the script and make some improvements. This led to a new minor revision of the mesh cutter (https://fireworkbench.com/fds_prepro_mesh/changelog). I also created a numerical test to ensure that the results obtained with multiple meshes still have the accuracy of those obtained with one single mesh. (https://fireworkbench.com/fds_prepro_mesh/whitepaper). If you have any suggestion or remark about this or other possible tools, please let me know.
Professor of ITB ?? Director-at-large at SFPE Europe ?? FireScienceShow.com ??
2 年Good job Matteo, Brawo!
Fire Safety Technical Specialist at NFU Mutual
2 年Is this going to take in to account the new Intel architecture of the Performance and Energy efficient cores (similar to the big.LITTLE ARM CPU's)?
Brandr?dgiver hos COWI
2 年Thank you for sharing your work with the FDS community. I am however a bit skeptical about that the tool doesn't take into account that the default pressure solver in FDS could give a lot of deviations especially around corners and places with high velocity, if you just split up your model without any other considerations than compute time.
Technical Director at RED Fire Engineers - Fire Engineer & Expert Witness. All views and opinions are my own and not that of my employer.
2 年Craig Mills this might interest you