Numerical simulation of hydrodynamic performance of ice class propeller in blocked flow using overlapping grids method

One the basis of the technique of computational fluid dynamics (CFD), combined with the overlapping grids method, this paper establishes a numerical simulation method to solve the problem of ice propeller interaction in a viscous flow field. A numerical simulation was carried out to forecast the hydrodynamic performance of ice class propeller and flow characteristics in blockage conditions. Trimmed Mesh is used in the entire calculation domain, and the overlapping grid method was used to transfer the information between the propeller rotation calculation domain and the ice calculation domain. The grids in the gap between the ice and propeller were set as partial grid refinement to ensure the accuracy of the flow field in detail. By comparing the CFD result with the model experimental results, errors of hydrodynamic performance results were within 5%. The feasibility of the calculation method can be verified. It appears from the analysis of calculation results that the propeller thrust coefficients and torque coefficients increased sharply at the point at which the gap between the ice and blade was less than 10%R. From the pressure distribution of the blade's surface, it can be shown that the blade screwing in ice interference area resulted in the fluctuating extremum of propeller hydrodynamic coefficient.