Numerical Simulation and Analyses of Oscillating Flow Characteristics in the Regenerator of the Standing Wave Thermo-acoustic Engine

A software on computational fluid dynamics,FLUENT, is introduced to simulate the oscillating characteristics in the parallel plate fold regenerator. Results show that for a specific point, pressure oscillations with the change of time is sinusoidal or cosine waveform, and due to the periodic oscillation of pressure, the temperature and velocity periodically changing around the balance point, the variation tendency is sinusoidal or cosine waveform too. The results also proved that acoustic structure in the standing wave system is not ideal standing wave, which may be due to the viscosity and inertia effect of the flow in the regenerator.