CFD analysis of the generic isolated indoor stadium: Impact of wind direction and roof configuration for wind drift in badminton

Abstract

Indoor stadiums are built to minimise the effects of the environment and weather on sporting events. The shuttlecock in badminton is extremely vulnerable to a slight wind gust caused by ventilation in the indoor stadium. It is critical in elite tournaments to design the driftless court area stadium without compromising player and spectator ventilation comfort. CFD simulation is used to study two roof structures widely used in indoor stadium construction: barrel and gable roofs with two ventilation openings in opposite directions for lateral and longitudinal airflow. The simulation is carried out in 3D steady Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) using the Shear-Stress Transport (SST) k- ⍵ model. Grid independency is carried out to compare the results with wind tunnel measurement data from the literature. The non-dimensional velocity and coefficient of pressure contour are obtained in the vertical centre plane and horizontal plane (H=0.06m and 0.02m) from the ground. Finally, the gable roof configuration with longitudinal wind direction volume flow rate increased to 26% and the average velocity in the horizontal (H=0.02m) is 0.19 leading to low wind drift near the ground. There is no huge impact on the roof configuration (barrel and gable) compared to the wind direction (longitudinal and lateral) of the opening in the model.