Prediction Of Cavitation Erosion For Marine Applications

The paper presents the development of a cavitation erosion prediction method. The approach is tailored to marine applications and embedded into a VoF-based procedure for the simulation of turbulent flows. Supplementary to the frequently employed Euler-Euler models, Euler-Lagrange approaches are employed to simulate cavitation. The study aims to convey the merits of an Euler-Lagrange approach for erosion simulations. Accordingly, the erosion model is able to separate different damage mechanisms, e.g. micro-jets, single and collective bubble collapse, and also quantifies their contribution to the total damage. Emphasis is devoted to the prediction of the cavitation extend, the influence of compressible effects and the performance of the material damage model in practical applications. Examples included refer to 2D validation test cases and reveal a fair predictive accuracy.