Numerical simulation for microstructure evolution of magnetorheological fluid based on combined disk DDA-LBM approach

In order to investigate the microstructure evolution characteristic of the magnetorheological fluid (MRF), a novel combined model coupling the disk discontinuous deformation analysis (disk DDA) model with the lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) called the disk DDA-LBM model is developed in this paper, and its acceptability is verified. After that, this new combined model is used to simulate the microstructure evolution process of the MRF. The simulation results clearly demonstrate the chain-process of the MRF, indicating that the proposed method exhibits a satisfactory accuracy in describing the microstructure evolution of the MRF. Simultaneously, a highly effective chain identification technique called Density-Based Spatial Clustering of Applications with Noise (DBSCAN) is introduced to quantify the number of particle chains within the MRF. The results demonstrate that this method can accurately identify magnetic chains in the MRF and tracks changes of the chain number throughout the entire chain-process of the MRF. [Display omitted] •A combined scheme bases on the disk DDA and the LBM is proposed.•The microstructure evolution of the MRF is investigated by the combined scheme.•The influence of particle volume fraction on the MRF is simulated.•The DBSCAN is employed to identify chain size and cluster of the MRF.