• Journal of the Society of Naval Architects of Korea
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• v.60 no.4
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• pp.240-247
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• 2023

In this study, morphological and hydrodynamic characteristics of the non-axisymmetric supercavity generated behind a disk-shaped cavitator were examined. By extending the previous study on axisymmetric supercavitating flow based on a boundary element method, hydrodynamic forces acting under the angle of attack condition of 0 to 30 ° and shape characteristics of the supercavity were analyzed. The results revealed that increasing the angle of attack by 30 ° reduced the length and width of the cavity by about 15% and the volume by about 40 %. An empirical formula that can quantitatively estimate the geometrical characteristics and change of the cavity was derived. It is expected that this method can be used to evaluate the shape information and force characteristics of the supercavity for the control of the vehicle in a very short time compared to the viscous analysis in the initial design stage of the supercavity underwater vehicle.

• Journal of the Society of Naval Architects of Korea
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• v.52 no.4
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• pp.305-314
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• 2015

In this paper, a numerical analysis is carried out to study the drag of conical cavitators, supercavity generation devices for the high-speed underwater vehicle. The realizable k-∊ turbulence model and the Schnerr-Sauer cavitation model are applied to calculate steady-state supercavitating flows around cones of various cone angles. The calculated drags of the cones are decomposed of the pressure and the friction parts and their dependency on the geometry and the flow conditions have been analyzed. It is confirmed that the pressure drag coefficients of the cones can be estimated by a simple function of both the cone angle and the cavitation number while the friction drag coefficients approximately by well-known empirical formulas, e.g., Schults-Grunow's for the drag of the flat plate. Finally a practical method for estimating the total drags of supercavitating cones is suggested, which can be useful consequently for the design of conical cavitaors.

• Journal of the Society of Naval Architects of Korea
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• v.50 no.6
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• pp.436-449
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• 2013

In this paper, a numerical analysis is carried out to study the characteristics of supercavitating flows and the drag of relatively simple two-dimensional and axisymmetric bodies which can be used for supercavity generation device, cavitator, of a high-speed underwater vehicle. In order to investigate the suitability of numerical models, cavity flows around the hemispherical head form and two-dimensional wedge are calculated with combinations of three turbulence models(standard $k-{\epsilon}$, realizable $k-{\epsilon}$, Reynolds stress) and two cavitation models(Schnerr-Sauer, Zwart-Gerber-Belamri). From the results, it is confirmed that the calculated cavity flow is more affected by the turbulence model than the cavitation model. For the calculation of steady state cavity flows, the convergence in case of the realizable $k-{\epsilon}$ model is better than the other turbulence models. The numerical result of the Schnerr-Sauer cavitation model is changed less by turbulence model and more robust than the Zwart-Gerber-Belamri model. Thus the realizable $k-{\epsilon}$ turbulence model and the Schnerr-Sauer cavitation model are applied to calculate supercavitating flows around disks, two dimensional $10^{\circ}$ and $30^{\circ}$ wedges. In case of the disk, the cavitation number dependences of the cavity size and the drag coefficient predicted are similar to either experimental data or Reichardt's semi-empirical equations, but the drag coefficient is overestimated about 3% higher than the Reichardt's equation. In case of the wedges, the cavitation number dependences of the cavity size are similar to experimental data and Newman's linear theory, and the agreement of the cavity length predicted and Newman's linear theory becomes better as decreasing cavitation number. However, the drag coefficients of wedges agree more with experimental data than those of Newman's analytic solution. The cavitation number dependences of the drag coefficients of both the disk and the wedge appear linear and simple formula for estimating the drag of supercavitating disks and wedges are suggested. Consequently, the CFD scheme of this study can be applied for numerical analysis of supercavitating flows of the cavitator and the cavitator design.

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Military Science and Technology
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.188-194
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• 2018

Recently a supercavitating underwater vehicle moving at high speed over 200 knots has been of interest for its practical advantage of the dramatic drag reduction. Many experimental and numerical studies have been explored, however most of the studies deal with the case of uniform flows. In this paper, we investigated physical behaviors of the artificial supercavity in a periodic gust flow. Experiments were carried out at a cavitation tunnel of the Chungnam National University(CNUCT), which is equipped to remove the gas supplied from outside of the tunnel. We devised an experimental apparatus generating vertical and horizontal gust flows, and investigated the supercavity formations at different periodic mode of the incoming flow.

• Journal of the Society of Naval Architects of Korea
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• v.55 no.1
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• pp.1-8
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• 2018

A cavitator plays an important role to generate the supercavity. Most previous numerical and experimental studies have been focused on the presence of cavitators alone. However, the body behind the cavitator causes a change in the wake flow and hence it affects generation and growth of the supercavity. In this paper, we present a boundary elementary method based on a potential flow analysis, and calculate characteristics of the supercavity formation depending on the change of the body shape of two-dimensional submerged objects. Various parameters such as cone angle of the cavitator, length of the forehead and diameter of the body are considered. The results show that the longer the forepart length, the longer the cavity is created under the same conditions, and also the change in the diameter of the body is the most influential factor on the growth of the supercavity. As a result, we suggest that it is necessary to carefully consider the influence of the body shape during the initial design stage of the supercavitating underwater vehicle.

• Journal of the Society of Naval Architects of Korea
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• v.55 no.3
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• pp.252-264
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• 2018

The calculation of steady-state cavitating flows around Supercavitating Underwater Bodies (SUB's), which consist of a circular disk head (cavitator), a conical fore-body, a cylindrical middle-body and either a boat-tail or a flare-tail, are carried out. To calculate the axisymmetric cavitating flow, used is a commercial computational fluid dynamics code based on the finite volume method, Fluent. From the analysis of numerical results, the cavity and drag, affected by the fore-body and tail of the SUB's, are investigated. Firstly, the effect of the fore-body shape is investigated with the same disk cavitator and a cylindrical rear-body of fixed diameter. Then with the same cavitator and a fixed fore-body, the effect of the rear-body shape is investigated. Before the cavity generated by the cavitator covers the slant of fore-bodies sufficiently, the larger the cone angle of the fore-body(i.e., the shorter the slant length), the larger the drag and the slower the development of cavity. After the cavity covers the fore-body completely so that the pressure drag component of the body is vanished, the characteristics of drag-velocity curves are identical. Also, as the tail angle is bigger, the cavity generated by the cavitator is suppressed further and the drag becomes larger. The peak of the drag appears for the flare-tail, i.e., when the tail angle is positive(+). On the contrary, the trough of the drag appears for the boat-tail, i.e., when the tail angle is negative(-). When the tail angle is 5 degrees, the peak of the drag appears at the body speed of 80m/s and the value of the drag is 43% larger than that at the design speed of 100m/s. When the tail angle is -5 degrees, the trough of the total drag appears at 75m/s and that drag is 30% smaller than that of the cavitator, which means the rest of the body has a negative drag.