A numerical study of hull/propeller/rudder interaction

A numerical study of the interaction between the hull, propeller and rudder is presented in this paper. The flow around a ship hull at full scale is first calculated using a RANS solver with a series of systematically generated grids. This grid dependence study is made for the total resistance of the hull and a grid density is chosen. The total resistance of the same ship at four Froude numbers at model scale are computed and compared with experiments. Then self-propulsion tests of the hull and propeller with and without rudder are simulated and compared with measured data. Good agreement is found. By moving the rudder backwards, the effect of the distance between propeller and rudder behind the hull is captured and shows the same tendency as the experiment. Flow fields, such as axial velocity contours at the propeller plane, slipstream deformation, due to the rudder, and limiting streamlines on the surface of rudder and hull are illustrated. Comparisons between two configurations with rudder at different positions are made. It is demonstrated that the present method is promising for evaluating self-propulsion characteristics of hull/propeller/rudder configurations.