Ansys Fluent: Modeling Thin Ducts in Large Air Conditioner Domain

 Entering a small thickness like 1.5 mm into a large domain in ANSYS Fluent can be challenging due to meshing limitations and potential contact issues. Here are some approaches to consider:

* Refined Mesh: Apply a refined mesh around the ducts to accurately capture the thin geometry. You can use ANSYS Fluent's automatic mesh adaptation techniques or manually refine the mesh near the walls of the ducts.

 * Shell Conduction: If the heat transfer through the duct walls is the primary concern, you can model the ducts as shells instead of solid bodies. This reduces computational cost and avoids complex contact modeling.

 * Symmetry Planes: If the flow conditions are symmetrical across certain planes, utilize symmetry planes to reduce the computational domain size. This can be helpful if multiple ducts exhibit similar characteristics.

 * Enhanced Wall Functions: For turbulent airflow simulations, consider using enhanced wall functions to model the near-wall region without requiring an extremely fine mesh everywhere.

 * Contact Settings: Define appropriate contact settings between the ducts and surrounding domain based on the physical interaction (bonded, sliding, etc.). ANSYS Fluent offers various contact formulations to handle these interactions.

By implementing these techniques, you can effectively model the thin ducts and address contact issues while maintaining reasonable mesh resolution and simulation time.