Investigation the effect of geometric parameters on hydrodynamic behavior of multihull vessels

The extensive development and design of multihull ships began in the second half of the twentieth century. Nowadays, many of these ships are built with different designs. However, less numerical and experimental studies have been conducted on their behavior compared to single hull ships. The length and distance of the two hulls are the factors influencing the wave pattern created around and between the hulls and, consequently wavemaking resistance. In this study, the effect of geometric parameters including length to diameter ratio and body spacing on the hydrodynamic performance of a vessel with a small water plane area surface has been studied using computational fluid dynamics. To investigate the effect of L/D on the wave pattern around the body, towing test is simulated for two models with different ratios in a wide speed range. Furthermore, to evaluate the effect of two-hull distance on the interference of waves between two bodies, two models have been simulated at different distances at different speeds in the computational fluid dynamics environment. Simulations are performed for two different draft. The effect of Froude number, length to diameter ratio and draft on hydrodynamic behavior of the model has also been studied. The pressure, friction and interference resistance of the two bodies are calculated and the wave pattern surrounding the body and between the two bodies is extracted and compared with experimental data, which indicates the reasonable approximation of numerical and laboratory results.