The Laboratory for Computational Science & Engineering (LCSE)

Play with a 2-D Version of the PPM Gas Dynamics Code on your own Windows PC. A 2-D version of the LCSE's PPM gas dynamics code can be downloaded from this Web site that will run a standard fluid dynamics test problem on your own PC. You might encounter a bug or two in the functioning of the window's controls, but this program has been run by University of Minnesota freshman successfully. If they can do it, you can too. Compressible fluid dynamics fans will recognize this test problem as the one first introduced by Emery in 1967. This is an updated version, with lots more interest than the original, so our freshmen would not get bored. Read about an earlier version of this program (we think it is backwards compatible and are too lazy to update the documentation) in the LCSE Wind Tunnel Experimenter's User Guide at www.lcse.umn.edu/PPMdemo/2DWindTunnel/files. You can introduce streams of either smoke in air or sulfur hexafluoride smoke, which will enter the wind tunnel at the left and help to visualize the flow, just like the people who made those beautiful pictures in An Album of Fluid Motion. Give it a try. At the worst it will only crash your PC. (Be warned that this application does not run properly on Windows ME.) [This software is provided with no assurance of its value in any respect. By downloading it, you agree not to distribute it and not to complain in any way about any effect or side effect of your use of this software. To run the software, you must download the .exe file and the associated DLLs that are on the above referenced Web site. You must have an Intel Pentium-III processor or better or equivalent to run this software. And watch out for that sulfur hexafuoride smoke. When it comes down the duct at the same speed as Mach 2 air, it hits the step in the duct at Mach 5! That can be a bit traumatic, as you can see in the image here. Maybe you are best advised to just stick to smoke in air. It's not real sulfur hexafluoride anyway -- just a gamma-law gas with a gamma of 1.09 and 4.88 times the density of air when at the same pressure and temperature. Enjoy. Oh, by the way, the multifluid aspect of this program is under development. So if it doesn't work for you, don't worry. It won't work for us either, so we'll fix it eventually and you need not send any E-mail to anyone about how it ruined your day by hanging, burning up your processor, or any other thing. Remember, you agreed not to complain. So don't.]