Large Eddy Simulations of Wind-Driven Rain on Tall Building Facades
Publication: Journal of Structural Engineering
Volume 138, Issue 8
Abstract
Wind-driven rain (WDR) on building facades may lead to water penetration, cladding damage, structural cracking, etc., which affect the durability of the claddings. This study aims to develop a numerical approach to the evaluation of WDR on tall building envelopes based on large eddy simulations (LESs) and a Eulerian multiphase model. The present method utilizes the concept of the multiphase model to deal with rain and wind, and both wind and rain motions as well as their interactions are treated under the Euler frame, which can significantly reduce the complexity in evaluations of WDR and simplify boundary condition treatments. Besides these advantages, unsteady-state WDR information such as the transient catch ratio of WDR, the spatial and temporal distributions of rain intensity, etc., can be predicted by the LES. A validation study shows that the simulation results agree well with the available experimental data, verifying the accuracy of the simulation approach based on the Eulerian multiphase model and LES. Furthermore, a LES of WDR on the 508-m-high Taipei 101 Tower was performed to illustrate the application of the present method and to investigate WDR on a tall building. Both the transient and time-averaged WDR results are presented and discussed, demonstrating that the present approach can provide more information on WDR than the existing methods.
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Acknowledgments
The work described in this paper was fully supported by a grant from the Research Grants Council of Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, China (Project No. CityU 117709), a research grant from the Research Committee of the City University of Hong Kong (Project No. 7002615), and a key grant from the National Natural Foundation of China (Project No. 90815030). The writers would like to thank Professor Edmund Choi of the City University of Hong Kong and Dr. Zuojin Zhu of the University of Science and Technology of China for helpful discussions. Finally, the writers are thankful to the reviewers for very useful comments and suggestions.
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Information
Published In
Journal of Structural Engineering
Volume 138 • Issue 8 • August 2012
Pages: 967 - 983
Copyright
© 2012. American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Sep 11, 2010
Accepted: Oct 14, 2011
Published online: Oct 18, 2011
Published in print: Aug 1, 2012
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