A differential equation for approximate wall distance

A partial differential equation to compute the distance from a surface is derived and solved numerically. The benefit of such a formulation especially in combination with turbulence models is shown. The details of the formulation as well as several examples demonstrating the influence of its parameters are presented. The proposed formulation has computational advantages and can be favourably incorporated into one- and two-equation turbulence models like e.g. the Spalart-Allmaras, the Secundov or Menter's SST model. Copyright (C) 2002 John Wiley Sons, Ltd.