Accurate computation of contact discontinuities in flows with general equations of state Original Research Article

The evolution of a contact discontinuity in a real fluid flow is particularly difficult to compute with a conservative scheme. Indeed, Godunov-type schemes involve an averaging step which may create an intermediate state with an incorrect pressure. Spurious acoustic waves are then generated. These waves affect transient simulations as well as implicit time-marching procedures for steady-state computations. However, a formulation involving the pressure as a dependent variable can be used to restore a fast convergence for steady-state computations.