CFD simulations
The computing times for a flow simulation depend on
• the choice of numerical algorithms and data structures
• linear algebra tools, stopping criteria for iterative solvers
• discretization parameters (mesh quality, mesh size, time step)
• cost per time step and convergence rates for outer iterations
• programming language (most CFD codes are written in Fortran)
• many other things (hardware, vectorization, parallelization etc.)
The quality of simulation results depends on
• the mathematical model and underlying assumptions
• approximation type, stability of the numerical scheme
• mesh, time step, error indicators, stopping criteria