Improving the Hydrodynamic Characteristics of Ship Hulls via Numerical Optimization Techniques

Numerical shape optimization of a tanker ship hull has been carried out with the aid of CFD techniques and experimentally verified. In the present study, total resistance and wave pattern have been used as objective function, and three different algorithms for the optimization process have been tested, coupled together with a CFD flow solver. A perturbation surface has been used to modify the shape of the hull, allowing for a sharp reduction of the number of design variables. According with different objective functions and geometrical constraints, several new optimized shapes of the bulb of a tanker ship have been automatically obtained. Among them, two optimized models have been built and tested, in the INSEAN towing tank, against the original design. In both cases the measured data have confirmed the success of the optimization process.