The present work describes a simplified Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) approach in order to calculate the propulsive performance of a ship moving at steady forward speed in head seas. The proposed method combines experimental data concerning the added resistance at model scale with full scale Reynolds Averages Navier–Stokes (RANS) computations, using an in-house solver. In order to simulate the propeller performance, the actuator disk concept is employed. The propeller thrust is calculated in the time domain, assuming that the total resistance of the ship is the sum of the still water resistance and the added component derived by the towing tank data. The unsteady RANS equations are solved until self-propulsion is achieved at a given time step. Then, the computed values of both the flow rate through the propeller and the thrust are stored and, after the end of the examined time period, they are processed for calculating the variation of Shaft Horsepower (SHP) and RPM of the ship’s engine. The method is applied for a bulk carrier which has been tested in model scale at the towing tank of the Laboratory for Ship and Marine Hydrodynamics (LSMH) of the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA).

The basic aim of this research was to compare the experimentally evaluated flow field at the stern region of a hull form with large block coefficient with the respective numerical results. To this end, a Five-Hole Pitot tube was used to capture the wake flow at the stern region of a scaled model of a bulk carrier in the towing tank of the Laboratory for Ship and Marine Hydrodynamic (LSMH) of the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA). The measurements were carried out at three aft sections of the model, where large scale vortices are usually generated: the section at the propeller, a section ahead of it and another one under the transom stern. The model was towed at a speed of 1.214 m/s, corresponding to Fn =0.17. The tube was calibrated on air at an equivalent Re, while a second in-house calibration technique was developed to consider installation misalignments and to increase overall measurement accuracy. The numerical calculation of the flow was performed using CFD tools developed at LSMH of NTUA. The method solves the RANS equations by applying the finite volume approach underneath a prescribed free surface which is derived by a potential flow code. The numerical results are in good agreement with the experimental ones, confirming the robustness of both methods.