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CFD modelling is an essential tool to improve the design of boats and increase their efficiency to be able to comply with ever more stringent emission standards. IdealSimulations offers consultancy services and bespoke software solutions for boat design, propulsion systems and ancillary systems optimisation.
A complete CFD simulation of a boat includes, in addition to the hull hydrodynamics, the analysis of the main propeller in a motor boat or with the sail modelling in the case of a sailboat. The simulation of the coupled systems of multiphase flows is important to characterise the boat performance and improve its design.
Representation of flow structures generated by a rotating propeller
For example, to correctly simulate the propeller performance, the rotation of the blades has to be taken into account in a transient simulation. A portion of the CFD mesh is rotated at each time step of the simulation. Once a simulation step is converged, the portion of the mesh is rotated again and the solution is mapped onto the surrounding mesh to continue on the following step. To evaluate the propeller profiles performance and the effect of surrounding geometries on the propulsion system, the simulation can be carried out for one or more complete rotations.
To simulate boat hydrodynamics it is necessary to consider the interaction of the hull with the water and the formation of the waves. Multiphase solvers can be used to simulate the interaction between water and air and study the wave shape and intensity which are generated a specific boat hull design.
Waves generated by hull breaking the surface of the water
Our software SimWorks implements the capability to automatically set up simulations at different speeds and directions to create a full boat hull resistance speed map and fully characterise the design. Once the map is completed different designs can be compared and optimised in different operating conditions. At the moment SimWorks is not supporting multiphase capabilities so the hull resistance can only be calculated in water, but in the near future it will implement multiphase solvers.