A Numerical Simulation of Ship Self-Propulsion Used Modified Body Force Method Based on Wake

Abstract In the numerical prediction of ship speed and maneuverability, the body force method offers significant advantages over real propeller modeling, including higher computational efficiency and a simplified mesh system. This paper proposes a modified descriptive body force method based on wake correction to simulate the self-propulsion of a full-scale KCS container ship. In this method, the nominal wake is used to modify the open water curve, which serves as the input for the body force source term. The source term is distributed across a cylindrical discrete body using the Goldstein optimization method, and self-propulsion simulation is performed by integrating it with the momentum equation. The simulation leverages an in-house computational fluid dynamics (CFD) solver based on the unsteady Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (URANS) method, combined with a custom overset code and a two-degree-of-freedom (2DOF) motion equation to model ship motion. Results demonstrate that the wake-modified descriptive body force method significantly improves the accuracy of self-propulsion factors, with simulation errors compared to experimental data reduced to less than 5%.