Paint thickness simulation for robotic painting of curved surfaces based on Euler–Euler approach

The purpose of this paper is to provide a method of the paint thickness simulation for robotic painting of curved surfaces based on the Euler–Euler approach in CFD theory. The Euler–Euler approach is proposed to be adopted to simulate the paint deposition process of painting curved surfaces with a moving spray gun in this paper. The paint deposition model established comprises two parts: a two-phase spray flow field model and a film model. The method of solving the model is also provided. In order to demonstrate the capability of the proposed method, three cases were simulated and experimented including painting a flat plate, an outer cylindrical surface and an inner cylindrical surface. It was found that the peak of the film thickness distribution on the inner cylindrical surface is the largest followed by that on the flat plate and that on the outer cylindrical surface. The film width of painting the inner cylindrical surface is wider than that of the outer cylindrical surface and the flat plate. The experimental results were in a reasonable agreement with the simulation results, which indicates the simulation method based on the Euler–Euler approach in CFD theory proposed in this paper to be effective and applicable in simulating the paint thickness for robotic painting of curved surfaces.