Abstract:
In this paper a general drift-flux model describing a subsonic and isentropic multi-phase
fluid in connected pipes is considered. Each phase is assumed to be isentropic with its own
sonic speed. The components are gamma-law gases with γ > 1. For such, a computational
challenge at a junction is the computation of rarefaction waves which do not have a
readily available analytical form. Firstly, the well-posedness of the Riemann problem at the
junction is discussed. It is suggested that rarefaction waves should be linearized in order to
obtain a more efficient numerical method for coupling such multi-component flow. Some
computational results on the dynamics of the multi-phase gas in the pipes demonstrate the
qualitative behavior of this approach.
