CFD computation of ship motions and added resistance for a high speed trimaran in regular head waves

ABSTRACTSome research work on CFD computation of ship motions and added resistance in waves for a high speed trimaran is carried out in this paper. The governing equations, Reynolds Averaged Navier-Stokes and continuity equations are discretized by finite volume method. Volume of fluid method is adopted to deal with the nonlinear free surface. The incident waves are generated from the inflow boundary by prescribing a velocity profile resembling flexible flap wavemaker motions, and the outgoing waves are dissipated inside an artificial damping zone located at the rear part of the wave tank. In this paper, the computed results of ship motion and added resistance for a high speed trimaran are presented. The results of seakeeping experiment for the high speed trimaran carried out in CSSRC towing tank are also presented in this paper. Rather good agreements are shown between the computational and experimental results. The work in this paper provides a numerical tool for the study of seakeeping performance of high speed trimarans.