Numerical Investigation on the Shallow Water Entry of Wedges

Abstract

The presence of the ground may influence hydrodynamic loads acting on structures in some water entry problems, such as the operation of high-speed planning vessels and the emergency landing of aircrafts in shallow rivers. While most investigations have been focused on the water entry with infinite water depth, the water entry with finite water depth is not yet to fully be analyzed. The shallow water entry of wedges is numerically investigated using the finite volume method in this paper. The applications of the numerical method in water entries with infinite and finite water depths are validated by comparing with previous theoretical and experimental results. Based on the validated numerical model, a series of systematic computations on the shallow water entries of wedges with different water depths and deadrise angles are carried out. Three non-dimensional ratios,Rp, Rr and RF, are introduced to quantify the influence of the presence of the ground on pressure field, free surface evolution and impact force, respectively. Then, the hydrodynamics related to the shallow water entry of wedges are investigated through the comparison with the infinite-depth water entry.

Keywords

• Computational fluid dynamics
• numerical modeling
• shallow water entry
• slamming
• wedge