Numerical optimisation of propeller-hull configurations at full scale

Journal article, 2006

Optimisation of propeller/hull configurations based on the Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) equations has been very rare so far, due to the large computational effort required. Virtually no such optimisation has been carried out at full scale, where only a few RANS methods are at all applicable due to stability problems. The present paper introduces a newly developed RANS solver especially designed for stability and this solver is shown to work well at full scale. Through a link to a commonly used propeller analysis code predictions of the viscous flow around the full scale ship with an operating propeller may be made. This is utilized in the work reported here, where the flow codes are introduced into a system for automatic optimisation. It is shown that even well designed propellers may be further improved both in a fixed wake and in the wake behind a fixed hull.