Hydrodynamic wave forces on two side-by-side barges subjected to nonlinear focused wave groups

Violent fluid resonance may occur in the narrow gaps formed by multiple marine floating structures arranged side-by-side, which heavily threatens the safety of operation, more seriously, and leads to the catastrophic failure of marine equipment. Based on a two-dimensional viscous flow model, this work aims to study the impacts of incident wave parameters, e.g., amplitude and spectral peak period, on the nonlinear transient features of wave loads acting on two side-by-side boxes, where the transient focusing wave group close to the real sea state is mainly concerned. At the same time, the weather-side box is allowed to freely heave motion using the overset mesh method, which overcomes the problem of calculation divergence caused by excessive motion of the traditional moving mesh. In addition, the effect of higher-order harmonic components on the overall hydrodynamic wave force is also investigated using the four-phase combination method. It is found that the period for the peak values of the amplitude-period curve of wave force and moment on the lee-side box is always larger than that on the weather-side box. Moreover, the impact of different incident parameters on the higher-order harmonic components is also distinct for varied physical quantities.