  Two widely used sub-grid scale models, the standard and the dynamic
Smagorinsky models were tested in a simulation of the flow in a thermally
driven 3D cavity at Rayleigh number of Ra=1E9. The main focus of the research
is the response of the subgrid scale models to the coarse mesh and their
ability to predict the flow in a thermally driven 3D cavity with the mesh
resolution below generally accepted LES standards. The research is motivated by
investigating a feasible modeling strategy for the particulate flow in the
wall-bounded side-wall heated cavity. As URANS and hybrid RANS-LES models fail
to produce modeled energy due to laminarization, the alternative is LES applied
on the coarse mesh. In a quantitative manner, first and second-moment
statistics are com-pared against both reference LES and experimental databases
from literature. For first moment statistics, both models globally predict the
flow field well. However, for higher moments, the dynamic model outperforms the
standard Smagorinsky model using the same mesh resolution. In a qualitative
fashion, we report the contours of both temperature and velocity fields as well
as the near-wall turbulent coherent structures. Results of flow quantities are
globally in very good agreement with both reference LES and experimental
measurements at a fraction of the CPU power needed for conventional LES.
