A numerical study on the effect of propellers on ship hydrodynamic forces in maneuvering motion

Abstract

The interaction among the hull, the propeller and the rudder is one of the important factors that affect the ship maneuverability. By solving the RANS equations in conjunction with the SST k-ω turbulence model, and taking the free surface wave-making influence into acount, the rudder force test and oblique-towing test of a KCS container ship model appended with a rudder and a propeller are numerically simulated in this paper. The propeller is modeled by the body force method. In order to study the effect of propeller on the ship hydrodynamic force in maneuvering motion, the simulations are conducted for the ship-rudder system with and without propeller respectively, and the hydrodynamic forces on the ship model changing with the drift angle and rudder angle are compared. It shows that the hydrodynamic force and moment of the ship-rudder system with propeller are more sensitive to the change of rudder angle; the operation of the propeller mainly increases the lateral force at the stern. In the rudder force test and oblique-towing test, the propeller has a significant influence on the lateral force and yaw moment.