Experimental and numerical investigation on the hydroelastic response of barge and KVLCC2 ship

In this paper, the hydroelasticity of two segmented ship models (Barge and KVLCC2) is investigated by experimental and numerical methods. A two-way Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) and Finite Element Analysis (FEA) coupled method is adopted and further validated its accuracy against experimental results. The current approach emphasizes the overall convergence between two solvers, maintaining a strongly coupled manner to comprehensively address the fluid-structure interaction phenomenon, including the added mass effect. A series of experiments of a segmented Barge and KVLCC2 under various wave conditions were firstly conducted. The motions of the models are measured and the displacement Response Amplitude Operators (RAOs) are calculated. The CFD-FEA coupled method is demonstrated in agreement with experimental results by comparing the numerical prediction with the tank test results in terms of motion, affirming the validity and robustness. Finally, the hydroelastic response is discussed and investigated.