Two-dimensional simulation of unsteady marine propulsor blade flow using dynamic meshing techniques

The unsteady flow around a marine propeller blade section embedded in a traveling wave field is simulated and the results are validated against the well-known experimental data. Unstructured dynamic meshing techniques based on smoothing and remeshing are implemented and applied. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology Flapping Foil Experiment is selected for the validation, as it reveals the complex unsteady flow physics on a typical marine propeller blade section. The comparison with experimental data is good in terms of the first harmonic amplitudes and phases of the surface pressure coefficient and streamwise velocity component around and in the boundary layer of the blade section. The validation results suggest that the present computational approach with the unstructured dynamic meshing techniques, which are also available for three-dimensional problems, is both easy to apply and accurate enough for more realistic problems.