Effect of side ratio on the two-degrees-of-freedom vortex-induced vibrations of the rectangular cross section model

The effect of the mutative side ratio (D/B) on the vortex-induced vibration (VIV) characteristic, aerodynamic characteristics, and the surrounding time-averaged and transient flow field of a rectangular cross section model were simulated numerically. Based on Fluent 19.0 platform, overset grid technology and the fourth-order Runge-Kutta method were used at Re 22 000. First, a rectangular cross section model with D/B = 0.25 was selected, and the simulation method and parameter settings were validated against previous literatures. The subsequent analysis compared and evaluated the effect of side ratio on the VIV response by focusing on statistical values of aerodynamic force coefficients, self-spectra, amplitude ratio, motion trajectory, and phase transition changes for stream-wise and cross-flow directions. Moreover, the study examined the influence of different models at different reduced velocities (U-r) on wake vortex-shedding. The findings suggest that, within a fixed cross-sectional area, a smaller side ratio leads to a weaker VIV characteristic and notably lower aerodynamic performance compared to a larger side ratio. The vortex-shedding mode of the rectangular cross section, particularly with a large side ratio, is less sensitive to changes in U-r compared to the standard square cylinder. An examination of the Reynolds number (Re) effect on the minimum and maximum side ratio models reveals that it has a more pronounced impact on the aerodynamic performance and VIV of the cross-flow when compared to in-line flow. In general, it is noted that larger side ratio model exhibits a stronger sensitivity to the variation of Re.