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Is it possible to use the previous value of the time varying variable

for eg: Suppose I have pipe whose inlet temperature is 298K with a specified uniform mass flow(m_flow), now suppose i am heating the pipe using a heater of 100 watts. The outlet temperature will be attain a higher temperature of suppose 302K, now if i have to use this outlet temperature as my inlet temperature (in the sense i am recircuilating the water), how would i be doing it?

is it possible to update the value of the inlet temperature based on the outlet temperature at the previous timestep? so that for the next iteration the inlet temperature will be the same as the oulet temperature in the previous iteration (in other words the fluid would be recirculating).

Thanks

prasadshet
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3 Answers3

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You cannot access the value in the previous time step. The closest you can get in Modelica is using delay(exp,T) to get the value T units of time ago.

sjoelund.se
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The timestep does not enter into it at all. A model that uses information about timestep is just wrong. Nature doesn't know or care about integration time steps, the model should reflect that.

It seems to me what you want to capture is transport delay. Transport delay is the delay introduced by the time it takes for molecules, electrons, etc. through the system. So presumably what you wish to model is the time it takes the inlet fluid to reach the exit. Again, this has nothing to do with the integration timestep but rather the velocity of the fluid and the distance it must travel. Once you know how long that takes (by either a priori knowledge of the system of by looking at the simulation results themselves), you can follow Marco's suggestion of using the delay operator.

Michael Tiller
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  • I did not explain myself very vell, sorry about that. I totally agree with Michael and just to clarify, I was suggesting to use continous differentiable equations as in the Modelica classes used to build the example I referenced _instead_ of using the delay operator. – Marco Romanoni Mar 21 '13 at 15:34
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In order to setup a proper model for the system you described I suggest you to look at the example :

Modelica.Thermal.FluidHeatFlow.Examples.IndirectCooling

Modelica.Thermal.FluidHeatFlow.Examples.IndirectCooling schema

of the modelica standard library ver. 3.2. Instead of one pipe you can put an ambient or control volume component to better suit you needs. Moreover using continous and differentiable equations (the delay function is not) you will benefit from some of the advantages of the Modelica code, e.g. you will be able to reuse your models in a much wider range of cases, solve inverse problems, solve initial value problems, ...

I hope this helps, Marco

Marco Romanoni
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