Preliminary comparison of physical and numerical simulations of hydrodynamic forces on underwater vehicles

During cruising and maneuvering, the hydrodynamic loads induced on underwater vehicles can be readily modeled and calculated using numerical (virtual) tanks. However, the results obtained from any numerical simulation should not be completely trusted unless satisfactory validation and quality assurance of the numerical results are obtained. To achieve a high degree of confidence in a virtual tank, the numerical results must be compared with experimental data (either laboratory or field data). The main goal of this paper is to present direct comparisons between the numerical results obtained from explicit finite element simulations and the results of physical model tests. The numerical simulations were conducted using a combination of two packages of commercial software, the ANSYS and LS-DYNA finite element codes. The physical experiments were conducted using the Marine Dynamic Test Facility (MDTF), at the Institute for Marine Dynamics of the National Research Council of Canada (IMD-NRC).