Design of an Advanced Waterjet

Abstract

State-of-the-art computer programs have been used to design a water jet for marine propulsion applications. The design was accomplished in an iterative process between a potential-flow design code and a folly viscous, three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics analysis program. These tools were first directed at the evaluation of three options: a single rotating blade row plus a stator; a rotating blade set consisting of main blades and splitter blades, plus a stator; and two co-rotating blade rows (an inducer and a kicker) plus a stator. In the second step of the design process, the single rotor/stator concept was optimized to maximize efficiency while matching a given design point. The resulting design is predicted to have much improved cavitation performance compared with a design accomplished with older techniques. Other advantages are reduced weight, shorter length, and lower manufacturing cost.