A pseudo-coupled analytic fluid-structure interaction method for underwater implosion of cylindrical shells

Underwater implosion, the rapid collapse of a structure caused by hydrostatic pressure, is a fully coupled, highly dynamic and nonlinear fluid-structure interaction (FSI) problem. The primary motivation behind studying implosion is the short-duration, high-pressure pulse generated in the surrounding water. This paper presents a simplified analytic method to estimate the energy in the pressure pulse, based on potential flow theory. The method accounts for the varying fluid pressure and accompanying FSI. The focus is on long, thin, unstiffened metallic cylindrical shells that collapse in mode 2. The implosion pulse energy is shown to be equal to the maximum system kinetic energy developed during collapse. The kinetic energy is calculated using an energy balance approach and analytic solutions for plastic energy dissipation and energy required to compress the internal air. The time-varying fluid pressure, and subsequently the work done by the fluid on the cylinder, is found using a novel explicit time-stepping methodology. The result is a pseudo-coupled analytic solution for the fluid pressure time history and implosion pulse energy. Solutions for pulse energy agree with RANS numerical simulations within 5%.