Designs of ducts through optimization

The design of propeller nozzles, despite the promising results achieved with numerical calculations,
is mainly based on systematic series.
Van Manen (1962), Van Manen and Oosterveld (1966) derived simplified
correlations and identified key points for both accelerating and decelerating shapes considering
efficiency, the risk of flow separation and
critical cavitation indexes for both the propellers and the surrounding
nozzles. In the case of accelerating duct geometries, a substantial increase
of efficiency was obtained at higher screw loading with relatively long
nozzles that instead have to be the shortest possible in lightly loaded
conditions to limit the nozzle drag which is substantial in reducing the
total propulsive efficiency. Similar analyses were proposed to investigate
the influence of maximum thickness and maximum camber over length
ratio and equivalent nose tail angle on the pressure on the outer duct
surface, controlling flow separation as well. Guidelines for decelerating
geometries were even scarcer. A favorable increase of the static pressure
at the impeller was evidenced only at low propeller thrust coefficients
with shorter nozzle length to minimize drag loss and the consequent
reduction of efficiency.
These key points turn, naturally, into the opposite objectives of a
design through numerical optimization. For an accelerating nozzle,
which is usually designed to operate close to bollard pull, the maximization of the duct thrust at a
given propeller loading conflicts with the
need of reasonably high values of inner static pressure to contrast cavitation inception. Most of the
thrust delivered by the duct depends by the
suction on the inner surface. In bollard pull conditions, a certain risk of
cavitation could be accepted (until the propeller does not suffer from
excessive thrust breakdown). In the case of functioning at higher advance
coefficients, a geometry that allows simultaneously to maximize the duct
thrust and to obtain reasonable values of static pressure against cavitation inception would be
preferred. On the contrary, for a decelerating
duct propeller operating at relatively high advance coefficients, maximization of the static pressure
with minimum increased duct drag turns
into the design objective. Avoiding simultaneously the risk of cavitation
on the outer surface of the nozzle in very critical working conditions has
to be considered as well. In parallel, the risk of flow separation has to be
accounted. This has been monitored experimentally and addressed in the
traditional and simplified design momentum theories with criteria on the
maximum sectional lift coefficient of the nozzle profile (Van Manen
(1962), Van Manen and Oosterveld (1966)). The analysis of the duct
forces via viscous calculations inherently includes the possible detrimental effects of flow separation
on duct performance.
A real design would require accounting for the interactions taking
place between the duct and the propeller to exploit the maximum from
both the designs: a nozzle providing the maximum thrust and the highest
possible level of inner static pressure and a propeller optimized (efficiency, thrust and cavitation,
depending on the application) for that
resulting flow. Such design is, of course, possible at a considerable
computational cost by analyzing the propulsive system as a whole.
However, it could take advantage of preliminary, independent, designs of
nozzles and propellers by themselves: an optimal duct (depending on its
accelerating or decelerating nature) to be adopted for the iterative definition of an optimal propeller
for those given conditions of flow. The use
of actuator disk models (as proposed in this work) to include the propeller into the calculations of
the duct performance, indeed, does not
permit any type of interactions on propeller forces being these ones
prescribed and independent by the performance (and the resulting
induced inflow) of the nozzle. Only by a blade redesign, it would be
possible to have a sort of feedback and to design the entire propulsive
system for a given total thrust. Similarly, by using a lifting line or a more
accurate BEM nested into the design loop, it would be possible to include
the changes of the propeller loading distribution due to the different
inflow of a modified nozzle shape in the optimization process of the
nozzle. This approach, of course, would still not consider the constraint
on the total delivered thrust. In both cases, being duct and propeller
performances dependent on each other (loading distribution changes
inflow which, in turn, changes loading distribution), additional inner
iterations would be required for any given nozzle shape. By assuming an
unchanged propeller thrust (i.e. unchanged actuator disk intensity),
instead, the analysis of the optimal geometries has to be restricted to
those nozzle shapes that delivering the thrust of the reference geometry
(i.e. not changing the working condition), improve performance in terms
of inner static pressure. This inherently implies that also nozzle induced
velocities to the propeller are assumed not to be reasonably affected by a
modified geometry that, having to provide the same thrust of the reference shape, should also be
significantly similar in terms of induction. Any
other case (i.e. an increase of the duct thrust at unchanged inner static
pressure or heavily changed velocity field to the propeller) has to be
regarded as the first step towards the redesign of propeller blades. In this
case, the propeller design will take advantage of the unloading which is
allowed by the higher thrust delivered by the newly designed duct.
A list of possible design objectives that could be exploited consists,
consequently, in:
For accelerating duct shapes, conceived for highly loaded
functioning:
○ Maximization of the nozzle thrust close to bollard pull condition
○ Minimization of the nozzle drag at higher advance coefficients,
when the ducted propeller provides the propulsive thrust for other
operating conditions of the ship (e.g. cruising speed for tugs; other
possible “mixed conditions” like those typical of a take home
propulsor, which needs higher thrust density than a conventional
one, with the necessity to operate at a certain speed)
○ Maximization of the inner static pressure in any operating
conditions
○ Avoidance of nozzle cavitation
For decelerating duct shapes:
○ Minimization of the nozzle drag at the design condition
○ Maximization of the inner static pressure at the design condition
○ Avoidance of nozzle cavitation
A design by optimization, definitely, can be explained as an automatic
“trial and error” procedure that, by analyzing hundreds (thousands) of
different geometrical configurations, iteratively changes their shape to
achieve a Pareto convergence of the designs towards the satisfaction of
the outlined objectives. For this purpose, an efficient tool for the characterization of flow features
and nozzle performance by including the
propeller action in the simplified form of an actuator disk (Sections 3.1
and 3.2) is necessary. A parametric description of the geometry to
manage automatically shape variations in accordance with given constraints (Section 3.3) is required
as well. The need to handle opposite
objectives requires the use of multi-objective optimization algorithms
that, in present calculations, are of genetic type. By exploiting the analogy of natural selection,
subsequent generations are created by
combining the best characteristics of each pre-computed combinations
via crossover and mutation. These algorithms, moreover, allow to
S. Gaggero et al. Ocean Engineering 145 (2017) 444–463
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avoiding local minima, with respect to which computationally efficient
gradient-based methods are more prone, by the inclusion of a certain
randomness in the selection of the characters of any subsequent generations allowing more
unrestrained analyses. This feature was considered
important for the analysis of trends and of the influence of combinations
of parameters. The entire process has been coded into the modeFrontier
(Esteco, 2016) optimization environment.