Realtime CFD ?
 

Placing this here in the hope that some of you smart people can figure this program/app out.

The (software ? ) is called Fluid X3D

Here is a link to a video of a render : https://youtu.be/5AzxwQpng0M

It APPEARS to even be opensorce :
" The fastest and most memory efficient lattice Boltzmann CFD software, running on any GPU via OpenCL."

"Space Shuttle 10 billion voxel CFD on 8x 64GB GPUs"

An example (DDGs first choice) of a computer that would take eight GPU: www.titancomputers.com/Titan-A575-Up-to-8x-NVIDIA-Multi-GPUs-Computing-p/a575.htm. $9,700 with one GPU; so 8xhundreds more. that's no home gamer rig.

OTOH the Github FAQ says
https://github.com/ProjectPhysX/FluidX3D

Have you tried it yet? It will be a while until I clear my schedule for this.

Fluid X3D
 

There's much we'd need to know.
* The Space Shuttle was a MACH-8, un-powered glider. Automobiles are subsonic.
* It only spent a very limited time in the atmosphere.
* It entered the upper atmosphere at 18,000-mph.
* Transitioning down to a couple hundred mph upon touch down.
* It operated in an unbounded flow domain, unlike an automobile which is severely constrained by the ground plane.
* It was essentially an all-vortex-generator, delta-wing lifting device. Vortex-drag on an automobile is of the highest form of drag. Designers would do all they could to prevent its formation.
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If Fluid X3D is an aeronautical CFD software package, it may be of zero use to us.
There may be requirements for the data cloud which precede the use of the program.
We might need a mini-supercomputer to run it.
Automotive requirements include 3D flow, which in implied in the software's title.
Viscous flow is a requirement.
Theoretically, it would require solving the Full Navier-Stokes Equation, which is for supercomputers, not desk-tops. 130-parallel desk-tops, yes!

We'd need the help of a qualified modeler.

Did you look at it at all?

www.opensourceagenda.com/projects/fluidx3d

also:

compatibility
 

None of that information addresses the specifics.
Vekke would have had to pay 23,000 Euros for the Solidworks CFD package.
A three-month rental was 2,300-Euro.
And his school may have been providing his work station.
According to Anthony Jameson, McDonnel Professor of Aerospace Engineering, Princeton University, just solving a wing section required 294,912 cells, requiring a solution for 1,474,560 unknowns.
EXA POWERFLOW required almost 48-hours run time, on a 130-core processor, for a single iteration of a Tesla.
Where do we get the billion-cell 3D laser-scan/ data-cloud of our test car?

I would like to remind: todays semi obsolete desktop 4+ core is equivalent to a cray supercomputer in 1990. Just needs a better OS.

Did you look at it at all?

'all'
 

I looked at your list.
I didn't see anything that would inform about decisions.
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1) where does the full-scale 3D laser-scan of millimeter-scale resolution point cloud come from? Or CAD-CAM file from the automaker?
2) do we need to pre-condition the cloud with a Kappa-Epsilon turbulence model?
3) do we need a 120-core processor, as with SIEMENS' STAR-CCM+ software?
4) does it perform wheel rotation?
5) how long can we expect to wait for a result? ( 3-hours and 25-minutes? as with a 120-core & SIEMENS? )
6) do we 'buy' it?
7) do we 'lease' it?

1) To Be Determined
2) [shrug]
3) Compatibility
4) [shrug]
5) Follows from 3).
6) and 7) Demonstrates a total lack of understandig of Free and Open Source software. You can charge for support.

This suggests you haven't visited the GitHub page at all. I'm not going to reproduce the nested list format for your convenience. The source is just a click away.
Can you tell us what the lattice Boltzmann method is or does?

FLUID 3XD
 

here's some things it would incorporate:
MACH number
Kutta & Joukowski airfoil theory
Karman vortex street
Haye's theory of linearized supersonic flow
Jone's slender wing theory
Prandtl's wing theory
Prandtl's boundary layer theory
Whitcomb's area rule for transonic flow
Navier-Stokes Equation
conservation of mass, momentum, and energy
Cartesian tensor notation
Reynolds equations
turbulence models
shock wave-boundary layer interactions
inviscid Euler equations
Kelvin's theorem
Crocco's theorem
entropy
Prandtl-Glauert equation
Laplace's equation\
Galerkin Method
frozen oscillatory modes
one-dimensional scalar conservation law
total variation diminishing ( TVD )
upwind biasing
rotated difference scheme
first-order accurate
second-order accurate
flux limiters
higher order antidiffusive terms
higher order corrective terms
multidimensional Euler equations
Courant-Friedrichs-Lewy ( CFL ) condition
Newton iteration
Gauss-Seidel method
Jacobi method
lower-upper ( LU ) factorization
Blended multistage schemes
Multigrid time-stepping
elliptic equations
hyperbolic systems
mesh generation
viscous flow simulation
Hyperbolic marching methods
potential flow equation
single finite element approximation
Delaunay triangulation
Voronoi diagram
polyhedral neighborhoods
constrained optimization
partial differential equations
conformal mapping
perturbation analysis
integration by parts

Word salad reflects cognative dissonance.

For one example: 'Navier-Stokes Equation'. Mooted by lattice Boltzman methods.

And you omitted OpenVDB. https://www.openvdb.org/

Maybe Vekke will show interest?

word salad
 

You just showed your hand and by your own doing revealed the vacuity of any command of the subject.
I reduce ten pages of highly technical science text from an authority on the subject to bullets, and this is my reward.

"Showed your hand"?

I don't claim 'command of the subject'. An unsorted keyword list is not informative. Which would be the salient line item?

Why aren't lattice Boltzman and OpenVDB pertinent?

I shan't experiment with Fluid X3D until my 3D printer is back up and running. Then we can compare notes.

edit:: I looked at the system requirements.
So to run it on an M1 Mac Mini I'd have to install a new operating system. There was one Linux distro I was going to watch. If I remember the name....

2nd edit:
Maybe Ubuntu in a VM?

Ubuntu would probably choke on the data. Some other Linux might not.

Oddly , some sort of COBOL variant might handle the data massaging

Lattice Boltzmann Method ( LBM )
 

This solver :
* uses Very Large Eddy Simulations
* it does not perform Large Eddy Simulations
* it does not perform Small Eddy Simulation
* it requires either a CAD-CAM data cloud, or 3D-scan
* it cannot solve 'holes' ( partial cooling systems ), cabin ventilation, lug nuts, windshield wipers, must be 'airtight'
* requiring CAD clean-up
* it requires a meshing program to generate the mesh
* it requires a turbulence model
* it requires post processing after simulation to create coefficients and flow data
* it's scan may be required to be reduced in resolution in order to 'quicken' computer time, using something like PowerDELTA.
* scan malformations must be 'fixed' with something like ANSA
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* Accuracy between (LBM) results and wind tunnel have been reported at a 13% deviation.
* (LBM) has been used for 'qualitative' 'trend' investigations, with no pretense of achieving 'accurate' numerical data.
* (LBM) cannot predict flow separation locations
* (LBM) cannot predict flow reattachment locations
* (LBM) cannot accurately predict an accurate wake geometry
* (LBM) cannot accurately predict wake size
* (LBM) 'reruns' can produce variability in results in spite of zero changes introduced into the 'test' parameters.
* (LBM) is capable of registering zero trends at all for some modification
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NOTE:
* the image of the Space Shuttle is associated with aeronautical CFD, with which attached flow is presumed, and aeronautical engineers are not concerned with 'solving' for it.
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CAUTION:
In automotive work, CFD is required to 'solve' the entire flow domain, not only the near-field around the vehicle, but also the far-field up to 2-meters away, in all directions, except underneath. This is where the computing penalty rears it's ugly head.
As of 2014, Dr. Theodore Wolf, of Mercedes-Benz reported that their ( industry-grade) CFD required 48-hours for a single iteration, whereas, they could get 25-measurements/day in their wind tunnel ( 50-results in 48-hours ).
Yes, Moore's Law marches on, with computers growing more powerful all the time.
Perhaps a member, or guest will step forwards with updated information about the current, complete, 'total cost' of University-grade CFD.
Dassault Corp. refused to communicate with me about Ecomodder.com crowd-sourcing their POWERFLOW software, as used by Tesla Motors.

Sounds like you've been doing some homework.
This is where I think OpenVDB shows benefit.

3D grids
 

The only CFD that will 'solve' an automobile completely is the 3D, Full Navier-Stokes Equations for viscous flows, plus a turbulence model.
The billions of cells required are presented in a spherical-coordinate system, with the vehicle at the 'center of the universe.'
The vehicle, along with the entire domain within the virtual test section must be 'solved' simultaneously, each cell affected by the dynamics of each cell bordering it, plus the boundary of the vehicle and 'floor.'
Cartesian grids can't do it.
X, y ,z, time, velocity, pressure, friction, inertia,, etc., for each cell is being solved as a function of what all it's surrounding neighbors are doing simultaneously.
As of 2011, computers were still not powerful enough to accommodate the requirements of the full Navier-Stokes equation.
They had it by 2014.
Industrial Light & Magic employed 3D- scans of actual 'real' dynamics to create the algorithms used in their CGI creations.
Take what they used and multiply by a thousand, and you might begin to represent what the full Navier-Stokes equations must navigate to predict, within 99% accuracy, what air is 'doing' around an automobile and it's flow domain. It makes 'rocket-science' look like 'Tinker-Toys'. I'm quite serious!

That's what I'm saying. With OpenVDB more distance cells are 'larger'. Each volex can have n attributes attached and available for computation.
https://www.openvdb.org/about/

'CFD' encompasses the algorithmic pseudocode to implement Botlzman or Navier-Stokes [whichever] and the the dataspace where the computation takes place. Open VDB offers the latter.

'grids'
 

I'm unsure what the term 'grid' means in terms of a 'spherical coordinate system.'
All the 'cells' are the same dimension.
There exist 'NO' a priori 'attributes' to any of the cells. They are all unknowns.
The 'word salad' that I provided includes some of the math required to 'define' each cell as the simulation proceeds. Just for giggles, let's think in the direction of solving for 1-billion unknowns. It's exponential compared to an aircraft.
'The Navier-Stokes equations represent, in principle, the true simulation of the physics of viscous flow.' Dr. Wolf Heinrich Hucho

Open VDP
 

It seems like this is limited to animation.
They're not measuring anything.
Their algorithms have been cribbed from actual kinematic phenomena recorded and stored in front a green or blue screen.
'Air' cannot be 'observed.'

OpenVDB
It's a physics engine used in animation
They're not measuring they're generating data.
It's computational. no green screen.
"air' can be described mathematically.

'physics'
 

here's some context:
* digital video interactive ( DVI ) undergirds today's viewer-controlled video.
* it was invented in 1988 by the David Sarnoff Research Center, Princeton, New Jersey, by Director, Arthur Kaiman and his team.
* it was the first time that motion images were created by a computer, using images originating from either CGI or a camera.
* digital processing and storage was the breakthrough.
* 'real looking' film was converted to 180,000 bytes/frame.
* then digitally compressed for storage on a laser-CD-ROM memory disc, by a compression algorithm, requiring a mainframe computer.
* decompression was handled by two, decompression algorithm, custom integrated circuits inside a personal computer, with joystick control, handling video and audio, memory block and logic block.
* computer software allowed the user to change colors, reposition objects, scan 360-degrees, or point to an object and get more information.
* The Radio Corporation of America ( RCA ) was involved.
* General Electric Corp.
* Microsoft.
* VLSI Technology Inc., San Jose, California.
* GE would donate Sarnoff Labs to SRI International.
* GE, retaining the rights to DVI ( DVI Technology Venture ).
* October 14, 1988, Intel Corp. acquired DVI Technology Venture.
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* the computer can reshuffle digitally coded bytes quickly manipulate what the viewer sees by simple commands.
* a panorama view can be created from any existing fish-eye photograph in memory.
* textures can be draped over any CGI object.
* flight simulators function this way.
* military training materials.
* business training materials.
* music videos.
* all images are generated from the CD-ROM.
* internally, a minicomputer is linked to a graphics workstation, and block-level architecture.
* as of 1989, a videodisc data rate was 4 Mb/s.
* Application software is outsourced to qualified vendors.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
* the 'dynamics' of physical phenomena appearing within the imagery, to the best of my knowledge, are simply 'artifacts' derived from scans of actual kinematics and dynamics which are stored in retrievable form within a lookup menu.
* the viewer experiences the 'look' of a dynamical systems which have been scanned and pre-recorded, not 'calculated' in the scientific sense of the word.
( George Lucas actually scanned film footage of real aerial dog fights in order to capture the dynamics later used in model, motion-capture-created dogfights appearing in Star Wars).
* While extremely sophisticated, even in 3D, the 'product' is very different from CFD, and I'm still unsure about the 'grid.'
* as of 1989, NASA's Numerical Aerodynamic Simulation Systems Division @ Ames Research Center reported that, 'the effect of turbulence, (is) something that no computer can yet simulate accurately.'
they went on to say that, to solve 'turbulence' would require a computer which was 1,000,000 times more powerful than the Cray Y-MP/832, which, according to Moore's Law, wouldn't be around until 2019.
One of my tasks today, is to see if I can find that Cray's capability in 1989.

I shall adress two of your points
Qualified vendors see the value in Free and Open Source software and the GPL. Evil vendors will attempt to 'embrace, extend and extinguish' as Microsoft is currently doing.
I've met and talked with Richard Stallman error: it was John Gilmore.
Adversarial Generative AI will generate speculative solutions en mass and pit them against a fitness alogrithm to find an optimal result. Kind of like a thousand monkeys with typewriters vs a literary critic.

'qualified'
 

I used 'qualified' within the context of an outside provider which has the technical ability to write all the code based on applied mathematics.
SONY Corp. would be an example:
They created code which interrogated two, pre-broadcast, adjacent lines which would emerge, placed in between the real signal material, across a video screen, interpolating a 'new', artificial broadcast line from their algorithm, creating a high-resolution image from low-res..
Not every entity has chops like that.

'AGAI'
 

There is no need of AI with respect to 3D, viscous-flow, bluff-bodies, in ground proximity, at super-critical Reynolds number.
The 'word salad' I mentioned was specifically created to 'do' sophisticated fluid mechanics.

Reviewing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digita...ve#Compression
So they capture a still frame and then extract the differences in subsequent frames to upscale from 320x240 to NTSC (640x480).

Currently upscaling is available as a free or paid service online: duckduckgo.com/?q=AI+upscaling&t=raspberrypi&ia=web

The new hotness is outpainting:

'upscale'
 

The outcome of their synthesis was a doubling of the image resolution, which may have required a higher resolution screen to begin with, in order to be able to add the intervening lines.

Several months ago, I came across a video on some beta CFD software. I think it Autodesk that was testing it.
What excited me, was that it has "predictive CFD " perhaps using A.I.
You would input a model, and the system would make suggestions on problem areas and solutions.
You could also test out certain additions, such as fairings and covers.
They came in a library much like the primatives used in 3D programs.
Apparently, the testing didn't go anywhere, and that's the last I have read of it.
I bookmarked it and forgot about it ( lost somewhere now )
However, I see AirShaper is offering something slightly similar.
It runs the test and can optimize your creation .
https://youtu.be/cZAhPQFINZ8
I'd love to see some of us do some testing on our cars in CFD.
I think we take a lot of crap because eventhough our aeromods can be proven to work by simply showing an increase in MPG, common people are more impressed to see some pretty CFD pictures alongside some cD data that shows a change.

'predictive'
 

It sounds like a virtual extension of 'cyber-physical systems ( CPS )', where non-stochastic search algorithms interact with virtual mechatronic structural model CFD solutions.
The algorithm searches along the domain of the model, morphing it's shape, then analyzing it's dynamics in an iterative process, compiling all the data, which can be automatically sorted for a 'best' outcome.
As long as 'Paris Dressmakers' dictate automotive shapes, there'll be a place for polishing turds, which CPS could certainly be a part of.
If, however, low-drag ever becomes a priority, then there's little to nothing new to be learned. Virtually all conceivable aerodynamic architectures had been investigated within the 80-years following the Wright brothers' flight.

AKA Adversarial Genrative AI.

I have yet to write Python code, but I'm convinced a solution to volk-CFD is in the future of Blender. Curently, the Geometry Node Editor is a graphical code generator that recently added animation nodes. A strategy of shrinkwrapping a curve over a mesh manifold, then converting it to a mesh and solidifying it might be a start.

OTOH, GTP Chat could make a good frontend.

GPT Chat's AI is writing Blender Python now! and you're gonna love it!
Not ready for it's closeup yet, but Blender has the Asset Library to populate with vehicles and mods, and OpenVDB to accommodate the far field that aerohead's favorite equations require. It could come down to writing a verbose description.

Mine would involve a vehicle that morphs from a Volkhart-Sagitta V2 above the axle line to Aston Martin Valkyrie below.

Youtube coughed up three videos, allowing a comparison of two front ends for OpenFOAM, and a Blender only solution.

FREE CFD & FEA Software in a Web Browser?!

Tesla CyberTruck | CFD Analysis of the Drag Coefficient – Tutorial | Forces Simulation

How to do Fluid Flow Simulations in Blender - For Advanced Blender Users!

This is a rabbit hole I've no time for at present. It's all free and open source. I did watch most of the videos.

The Blender only solution is inferior, but I speculate results might be better if it employed the hair physics instead of particle physics. Long hairs should act like streamlines, not crossing each other's path.