Simulation of wake bimodality behind squareback bluff-bodies using LES

•Wall-resolved and wall-modelled large eddy simulation can capture wake bimodality.•Front separation bubbles shed large hairpin vortices that are convected downstream.•The shedding process is associated with high levels of turbulent kinetic energy.•This zone of high turbulent kinetic energy is required for wake bimodal switches. A large eddy simulation (LES) study of the flow around a 1/4 scale squareback Ahmed body at ReH=33,333 is presented. The study consists of both wall-resolved (WRLES) and wall-modelled (WMLES) simulations, and investigates the bimodal switching of the wake between different horizontal positions. Within a non-dimensional time-window of 1050 convective flow units, both WRLES and WMLES simulations, for which only the near-wall region of the turbulent boundary layer is treated in a Reynolds-averaged sense, are able to capture horizontal (spanwise) shifts in the wake’s cross-stream orientation. Equilibrium wall-models in the form of Spalding’s law and the log-law of the wall are successfully used. Once these wall-models are, however, applied to a very coarse near-wall WMLES mesh, in which a portion of the turbulent boundary layer’s outer region dynamics is treated in a Reynolds-averaged manner as well, large-scale horizontal shifts in the wake’s orientation are no longer detected. This suggests larger-scale flow structures found within the turbulent boundary layer’s outer domain are responsible for generating the critical amount of flow intermittency needed to trigger a bimodal switching event. By looking at mean flow structures, instantaneous flow features and their associated turbulent kinetic energy (TKE) production, it becomes clear that the front separation bubbles just aft of the Ahmed body nose generate high levels of TKE through the shedding of large hairpin vortices. Only in the reference WRLES and (relatively) fine near-wall mesh WMLES simulations are these features present, exemplifying their importance in triggering a bimodal event. This motivates studies on the suppression of wake bimodality by acting upon the front separation bubbles.