Numerical Simulation of Cavitation Characteristics for Pump-jet Propeller

Abstract

With k - ε turbulent model, non-cavitating performance of a pump-jet propeller was obtained by calculating RANS equations. The comparison between calculation results and experiment data shown that the numerical model and method was reliable. The cavitating hydrodynamic performance of it was calculated and analyzed with mixture homogeneous flow cavitation model based on Rayleigh-Plesset equations and sliding mesh. The effects of different inlet velocity ratio, cavitation number and flow velocity on cavitation characteristics of pump-jet were studied. When the cavitation occurred on the blades, the propeller thrust and torque decreased significantly, thereby causing open water efficiency reduced 15%. For the same cavitation number, as the inlet velocity ratio decreased, the pump-jet propeller blade cavitation phenomenon was more obvious. While for the same ratio, the smaller the number of cavitation, cavitation phenomenon was more remarkable. The more significant was that while the cavitation number was greater than a certain value, the blade cavitation phenomenon disappeared.