Investigation of the Effects of Baffles on the Shallow Water Sloshing in A Rectangular Tank Using A 2D Turbulent ISPH Method

Liquid sloshing is a common phenomenon in the liquid tanks transportation. Liquid waves lead to fluctuating forces on the tank wall. Uncontrolled fluctuations lead to large forces and momentums. Baffles can control these fluctuations. A numerical method, which has been widely used to model this phenomenon, is Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics(SPH). The Lagrangian nature of this method makes it suitable for simulating free surface flows. In the present study, an accurate Incompressible Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics(ISPH) method is developed and improved using the kernel gradient correction tensors, particle shifting algorithms, k–ε turbulence model, and free surface particle detectors. Comparisons with the experimental data approve the ability of the present algorithm for simulating shallow water sloshing. The main aim of this study is to investigate the effects of the vertical baffle on the damping of liquid sloshing. Results show that baffles number has a major role in sloshing fluctuation damping.     

Hydroelastic analysis of floating structures with liquid tanks and comparison with experimental tests

In this study, we develop a numerical method for a 3D linear hydroelastic analysis of floating structures with liquid tanks subjected to surface regular water waves and compare the numerical results with experimental tests. Considering direct couplings among structural motion, sloshing, and water waves, a mathematical formulation and a numerical method extended from a recent work [1] are developed. The finite element method is employed for the floating structure and internal fluid in tanks, and the boundary element method is used for the external fluid. The resulting formulation completely incorporates all the interaction terms including hydrostatic stiffness and the irregular frequency effect is removed by introducing the extended boundary integral equations. Through various numerical tests, we verify the proposed numerical method. We also performed 3D hydroelastic experimental tests of a floating production unit (FPU) model in an ocean basin. The measured dynamic motions are compared with the numerical results obtained using the proposed method.     

Boundary element analysis of liquid sloshing characteristics in axisymmetric tanks with various porous baffles

This paper aims to investigate the effects of the porous baffles on the suppression of sloshing for the tanks with axisymmetric geometries under lateral excitation. Based on the assumptions of inviscid, irrotational, incompressible liquid and small amplitude sloshing, an axisymmetric boundary element method (BEM) for 3D Laplace equation is derived by using the Green's theorem together with the weighted residual method. And a zoning method is employed to model fluid domain in the tanks with complex porous baffles. Meanwhile, the porous baffles are treated motioning together with the tanks, and the velocity across the porous baffle is assumed to be linearly proportional to the pressure gradient between each side of the porous baffle. And the mechanism of suppressing the sloshing response is mainly the energy dissipation of the fluid passing through the porous baffle. Moreover, the linear free surface boundary conditions are also used to solve the governing equations. Compared with other numerical methods, the most prominent advantage of the BEM in solving axisymmetric potential problem is that only the boundaries of half the cross-section instead of the entire problem domain should be discretized, which can cut down large amount of memory and time costs. The present method is verified by comparing the numerical results with the existing literatures, and excellent agreements are obtained. Meanwhile, the proposed models are applied to investigate the effects of the porous baffles on sloshing response in circular cylindrical, annular cylindrical and conical tanks. The effects of the porous baffle length, porous-effect parameter, installation angle and baffle height on the sloshing force, natural frequency and surface elevation are studied. Additionally, some typical sloshing pressure distributions, velocity potential contours and velocity fields are plotted. The results show that swirls at the tips of the baffles can be observed in many cases, and the top-mounted porous baffle makes more significant suppression effects on sloshing response than that of bottom-mounted porous baffle, while increasing the number of ring porous baffles can achieve better restraint effects on sloshing response. And increasing the baffle length of the horizontal wall-mounted ring porous baffle can significantly decrease the sloshing frequencies, as well as the first non-dimensional natural frequency decreases with decrease in porous-effect parameter of the coaxial porous baffle. In addition, remarkable effects on sloshing can be obtained when reasonable designed by selecting the optimal porous-effect parameter, installation angle and baffle height. And this paper can be a useful guide for the seismic design and analysis of many actual liquid storage tanks (such as the Advanced Passive PWR, large water cooling tower, etc.).     

A modal approach to second-order analysis of sloshing using boundary element method

This paper aims at developing a modal approach for the non-linear analysis of sloshing in an arbitrary-shape tank under both horizontal and vertical excitations. For this purpose, the perturbation technique is employed and the potential flow is adopted as the liquid sloshing model. The first- and second-order kinematic and dynamic boundary conditions of the liquid-free surface are used along with a boundary element model which is formulated in terms of the velocity potential of the liquid-free surface. The boundary element model is used to determine the natural mode shapes of sloshing and their corresponding frequencies. Using the modal analysis technique, a non-linear model is presented for the calculation of the first- and second-order potential which can be used to obtain a reduced-order model for the sloshing dynamics. The results of the presented model are verified with the analytical solution for the second-order analysis of sloshing in a rectangular tank and very good results were obtained. Also, the second-order sloshing in some other example tanks with complex bed shapes is studied. The second-order resonance conditions of liquid sloshing in the example tanks are investigated and some conclusions are drawn.     

考虑晃荡效应的独立B型LNG液舱结构多目标优化

独立B型LNG液舱内部设置舱壁板材及多种桁材,有效缓解了液舱晃荡效应。针对晃荡载荷下的独立B型LNG液舱结构多目标优化,利用规范中的公式计算晃荡载荷,并引入液舱晃荡系数,以期综合反映液舱内部构件对晃荡特性的影响,在此基础上进一步建立以液舱结构重量和液舱晃荡系数为目标的多目标优化模型,采用多目标遗传算法(NCGA),计算得到改进的独立B型LNG液舱结构设计方案。     

MPS方法数值模拟液舱晃荡问题

基于无网格粒子法MPS方法(moving particle semi-implicit method)研究了液舱晃荡问题。针对二维矩形液舱晃荡问题进行了数值验证,结果表明MPS方法能够很好地计算晃荡产生的拍击压力。同时将MPS方法应用到带隔板的液舱晃荡问题计算中,分析了二维和三维带隔板液舱晃荡问题。计算结果表明:隔板的存在很大程度地限制了流体的水平运动,隔板附近出现了自由面的翻卷、破碎和融合现象,MPS方法能够很好地模拟这些流动现象。计算得到的波高与实验测得的波高吻合较好,表明MPS方法模拟带隔板的晃荡问题具有一定的可靠性。     

Three-dimensional liquid sloshing in a tank with baffles

A numerical model has been developed to study three-dimensional (3D) liquid sloshing in a tank with baffles. The numerical model solves the spatially averaged Navier-Stokes equations, which are constructed on a non-inertial reference frame having six degree-of-freedom (DOF) of motions. The large-eddy-simulation (LES) approach is employed to model turbulence by using the Smagorinsky sub-grid scale (SGS) closure model. The two-step projection method is employed in the numerical solutions, aided by the Bi-CGSTAB technique to solve the pressure Poisson equation for the filtered pressure field. The second-order accurate volume-of-fluid (VOF) method is used to track the distorted and broken free surface. The baffles in the tank are modeled by the concept of virtual boundary force (VBF) method. The numerical model is first validated against the available analytical solution and experimental data for two-dimensional (2D) liquid sloshing in a tank without baffles. The 2D liquid sloshing in tanks with baffles is then investigated. The numerical results are compared with other results from available literatures. Good agreement is obtained. Finally, the model is used to study 3D liquid sloshing in a tank with vertical baffles. The effect of the baffle is investigated and discussed.     

The effects of LNG-tank sloshing on the global motions of LNG carriers

The coupling and interactions between ship motion and inner-tank sloshing are investigated by a time-domain simulation scheme. For the time-domain simulation, the hydrodynamic coefficients and wave forces are obtained by a potential-thoery-based three-dimensional (3D) diffraction/radiation panel program in frequency domain. Then, the corresponding simulations of motions in time domain are carried out using convolution integral. The liquid sloshing in a tank is simulated in time domain by a Navier–Stokes solver. A finite difference method with SURF scheme is applied for the direct simulation of liquid sloshing. The computed sloshing force and moment are then applied as external excitations to the ship motion. The calculated ship motion is in turn inputted as the excitation for liquid sloshing, which is repeated for the ensuing time steps. For comparison, we independently developed a coupling scheme in the frequency domain using a sloshing code based on the linear potential theory. The hydrodynamic coefficients of the inner tanks are also obtained by a 3D panel program. The developed schemes are applied to a barge-type FPSO hull equipped with two partially filled tanks. The time-domain simulation results show similar trend when compared with MARIN's experimental results. The most pronounced coupling effects are the shift or split of peak-motion frequencies. It is also found that the pattern of coupling effects between vessel motion and liquid sloshing appreciably changes with filling level. The independent frequency-domain coupled analysis also shows the observed phenomena.     

On the analysis of sloshing of water in rectangular containers: Numerical study and experimental validation

In this work the analysis of sloshing of water in rectangular open tanks has been extensively carried out. Two mathematical models are employed, respectively the Reynolds Averaged Navier Stokes Equations (RANSE) and the Shallow Water Equations (SWE). The RANSE are solved using a modified form of the well established MAC method (SIMAC) able to treat both the free surface motion and the viscous stresses over the rigid walls accurately. The Shallow Water Equations are solved by means of a simple and powerful algorithm (CE-SE) able to deal with large impacting waves over the tank walls.Successively, in order to validate the mentioned algorithms and for a better understanding of the sloshing phenomenon, experimental tests have been carried out using a 0.5 m breadth rectangular tank in periodic roll motion.It has been shown that RANSE provide more accurate solutions than SWE for small or moderate amplitudes of excitation. In particular in this paper it is proved that the shallow water approximation can be efficiently adopted within liquid depth to tank breadth RATIO = 0.15, when examining the sloshing problem. By increasing the water level inside the tank, results by SWE show large qualitative and quantitative disagreement with experiments. Nevertheless, in the case of large amplitude excitation, when sprays and large breaking waves are expected, SWE provide a fairly good estimate of the sloshing induced waves.Finally a simple baffle configuration inside the tank has been considered. By the analysis of numerical results, it has been observed that the presence of a vertical baffle at the middle of the tank dramatically changes the sloshing response compared to the unbaffled configuration. It produces a jump-like effect, resulting in a weak magnification of the dynamic loads on the vertical walls out of resonance, and a strong reduction of the dynamic loads in the resonance condition.     

Roll performance of a small fishing vessel with live fish tank

The concept of live fish tanks in trawlers is to use the catch in a better condition and to reduce marine pollution. It also reduces the infrastructure meant to freeze the catch to preserve it for longer period. But the presence of additional free surface in the vessel challenges the stability of the vessel. This is besides the sloshing effect due to the moving liquid mass in the tank. Roll motions are initiated due to various factors related to the hull characteristics of the vessel, loading and operating conditions and its interaction with the environment. Location of fish tank, its orientation, arrangement of baffles inside the tank to reduce the free surface affects and careful design of tank opening are to be given priority during the design, manufacturing and tank testing. The results obtained from tank test of model are compared with that of analytical method. The non-linear roll performance become further complicated due to the free surface and sloshing effects of the mass in the live fish tank. Wave makers are used for generating waves under laboratory conditions compatible with the scaled down model of the trawler model. The tests are conducted in the towing tank of Pusan National University.     

Experimental Study on Sloshing Characteristics in the Elastic Tank Based on Morlet Wavelet Transform

Hydroelastic effect of sloshing is studied through an experimental investigation. Different excitation frequencies are considered with low-fill-depth and large amplitude. Morlet wavelet transform is introduced to analyze the free surface elevations and sloshing pressures. It focuses on variations and distributions of the wavelet energy in elastic tanks. The evolutions of theoretical and experimental wavelet spectra are discussed and the corresponding Fourier spectrums are compared. Afterwards, average values of the wavelet spectra are extracted to do a quantitative study at various points. From the wavelet analysis, sloshing energies are mainly distributed around the external excitation frequency and expanded to high frequencies under violent condition. In resonance, experimental wavelet energy of the elevation in elastic tanks is obviously less than that in the rigid one; for sloshing pressures, the elastic wavelet energy close to the rigid one and conspicuous impulse is observed. It recommends engineers to concern the primary natural frequency and impulsive peak pressures.     

Numerical simulation of sloshing waves in a 3D tank based on a finite element method

The sloshing waves in a three dimensional (3D) tank are analysed using a finite element method based on the fully non-linear wave potential theory. When the tank is undergoing two dimensional (2D) motion, the calculated results are found to be in very good agreement with other published data. Extensive calculation has been made for the tank in 3D motion. As in 2D motion, in addition to normal standing waves, travelling waves and bores are also observed. It is found that high pressures occur in various circumstances, which could have important implications for many engineering designs.     

FLNG液舱晃荡压力影响因素及安全性评估研究

针对大型浮式液化天然气储卸生产装置FLNG的液舱晃荡压力变化特征,在深水试验池中开展带液舱模型的FLNG水池模型试验研究。通过试验,获得了FLNG在风浪流联合作用下的浮体六自由度运动,以及相应的液面高度变化数据。通过液舱的液面高度变化数据,提出平液面假设,并在此基础上,求得液舱晃荡引起的舱壁压力变化结果。研究中进一步讨论了液舱晃荡压力的影响因素,并将试验数据与CCS船级社规范计算结果进行对比,为FLNG液舱晃荡压力引起的结构安全性评估提供技术支持。     

畸形波生成、演化过程研究——波面时间过程随位置的变化

基于完全非线性波浪数值模型,模拟实测畸形波的生成、演化过程,进而分析波面时间过程和畸形波参数的变化规律.研究结果表明:在畸形波形成前、后均可能出现连续的大波和“深谷”现象.在畸形波生成、演化过程中出现的“深谷”和畸形波具有伴生性而非独立异常波浪现象.上述大波、“深谷”和畸形波的连续作用对海洋结构物和船舶造成的潜在威胁可...     

A probabilistic assessment of design sloshing pressure time histories in LNG tanks

The violent motion (sloshing) of liquefied natural gas (LNG) in cargo tanks has attracted significant attention. Transformations of the LNG market have led to the increased transport of LNG in partially filled tanks, but established technology is mainly based on engineering experience with completely filled containers. This paper investigates a large sample of sloshing pressure measurements. It focuses on the magnitude of individual sloshing impact events, and their associated temporal and spatial patterns. The durations of these impacts are comparable to the natural frequency of an LNG container wall, so the details of their time histories are important in determining the structural response. Experiments are performed on tanks with high (92.5%) and low (30%) filling levels, for various wave headings. The common post-processing approach of representing impact pressure histories by a triangular profile is studied, and an alternative approach is presented. Two statistical models are used to describe the distribution of maximal pressures in sloshing impacts: a three-parameter Weibull model and a generalized Pareto model. The latter is found to be of questionable utility due to small sample sizes. It is observed that for low filling levels the sloshing impacts are of greater magnitude, having longer durations, smaller ratios of rise time to duration, and larger spatial extents. All these factors should in principle increase the structural response.     

极限波浪运动特性的非线性数值模拟

利用时域高阶边界元方法建立了模拟极限波浪运动的完全非线性数值模型,其中自由水面满足完全非线性自由水面条件.采用半混合欧拉-拉格朗日方法追踪流体瞬时水面,运用四阶Runge-Kutta方法更新下一时间步的波面和速度势,同时应用镜像格林函数消除水槽两个侧面和底面上的积分.研究中利用波浪聚焦的方法产生极限波浪,并且在水槽中开展了物理模型实验,将测点试验数据与数值结果进行了对比,两者吻合得很好.对极限波浪运动的非线性和流域内速度分布进行了研究.     

Study on coupling effects of ship motion and sloshing

This study considers the coupling effects of ship motion and sloshing. The linear ship motion is solved using an impulse-response-function (IRF) method, while the nonlinear sloshing flow is simulated using a finite-difference method. The IRF method requires the frequency-domain solution prior to conversion to time domain, but the computational effort is much less than that of direct time-domain approaches. The developed scheme is verified by comparing the motion RAOs between the frequency-domain solution and the solution obtained by the IRF method. Furthermore, a soft-spring concept and linear roll damping are implemented to predict more realistic motions of surge, sway, yaw, and roll. For the simulation of sloshing flow in liquid tanks, a physics-based numerical approach adopted by Kim [2001. Numerical simulation of sloshing flows with impact load. Applied Ocean Research 23, 53–62] and Kim et al. [2004. Numerical study on slosh-induced impact pressures on three-dimensional prismatic tanks. Applied Ocean Research 26, 213–226] is applied. In particular, the present method focuses on the simulation of the global motion of sloshing flow, ignoring some local phenomena. The sloshing-induced forces and moments are added to wave-excitation forces and moments, and then the corresponding body motion is obtained. The developed schemes are applied for two problems: the sway motion of a box-type barge with rectangular tanks and the roll motion of a modified S175 hull with rectangular anti-rolling tank. Motion RAOs are compared with existing results, showing fair agreement. It is found that the nonlinearity of sloshing flow is very important in coupling analysis. Due to the nonlinearity of sloshing flow, ship motion shows a strong sensitivity to wave slope.     

Effects of perforated baffle on reducing sloshing in rectangular tank: Experimental and numerical study

A liquid sloshing experimental rig driven by a wave-maker is designed and built to study liquid sloshing problems in a rectangular liquid tank with perforated baffle. A series of experiments are conducted in this experimental rig to estimate the free surface fluctuation and pressure distribution by changing external excitation frequency of the shaking table. An in-house CFD code is also used in this study to simulate the liquid sloshing in three-dimensional （3D） rectangular tank with perforated baffle. Good agreements of free surface elevation and pressure between the numerical results and the experimental data are obtained and presented. Spectral analysis of the time history of free surface elevation is conducted by using the fast Fourier transformation.     

Complete two-dimensional analysis of sea-wave-induced fully non-linear sloshing fluid in a rigid floating tank

A time-independent finite-difference method and a fifth-order Runge–Kutta–Felhberg scheme were used to analyze the dynamic responses of sea-wave-induced fully non-linear sloshing fluid in a floating tank. The interaction effect between the fully non-linear sloshing fluid and the floating tank associated with coupled surge, heave and pitch motions of the tank are analyzed for the first time in the present pilot study. For the analysis of fluid motion in the tank, the coordinate system is moving (translating and rotating) with tank motion. The time-dependent water surface of the sloshing fluid is transformed to a horizontal plane and the flow field is mapped on to a rectangular region. The Euler equations as well as the fully non-linear kinematic free surface condition were used in the analysis of the sloshing fluid. The strip theory for linearized harmonic sea-wave loading was adopted to evaluate the regular encounter wave force. In addition, the dynamic coefficients used in the dynamic equations of tank motion were also derived based on strip theory and a harmonic motion of the tank. The characteristics of free and forced tank motions with and without the sloshing effect are studied. By the damping effect, the response of free oscillation will damp out and that of forced oscillation will approach a steady state. Without sea-wave action, the contribution of the sloshing load would enlarge the angular response of tank motion as well as the rise of free surface and the sloshing effect will delay the damping effect on angular displacement. On the contrary, under sea-wave action, the sloshing effect will decrease the dynamic response of tank motion and rise of free surface. The interaction, sloshing and coupling effects are found to be significant and should be considered in the analysis and design of floating tanks.     

Sloshing waves and resonance modes of fluid in a 3D tank by a time-independent finite difference method

A 3D time-independent finite difference method is developed to solve for wave sloshing in a three-dimensional tank excited by coupled surge and sway motions. The 3D equations of fluid motion are derived in a moving coordinate system. The three-dimensional tank, with an arbitrary depth and a square base, is subjected to a range of excitation frequencies with motions that exhibit multiple degrees of freedom. For demonstration purposes the numerical scheme is validated by a benchmark study. Five types of sloshing waves were observed when the tank is excited by various excitation frequencies. A spectral analysis identified the resonant frequencies of each type of wave and the results show a strong correlation between resonant modes and the occurrence of the sloshing wave types. The method can be used to simulate fluid sloshing in a 3D tank with six-degrees of freedom.