The Surface Singularity or Boundary Integral Method Applied to Supercavitating Hydrofoils

Abstract

The surface singularity or boundary integral method is formulated numerically for the problem of the fully nonlinear potential flow past a supercavitating flat-plate hydrofoil. An iterative scheme is employed to locate the cavity surface. Upon convergence, the exact boundary conditions are satisfied on the foilcavity boundary. The predictions of the nonlinear model are compared with those generated by linear theory and with experimental data. In contrast to the results for the partialy cavitating case, the predictions of the linear theory for supercavitating flat-plate hydrofoils are seen to be excellent.