Study on the Powering Performance Evaluation for the Pod Propulsion Ships

The procedures of model tests and powering performance prediction for twin pod propulsion ships are studied. For model tests, new propeller dynamometer and single component balance for unit thrust measurement were developed and several test set-ups for open water test and self-propulsion test were designed with special effort of propeller dynamometer calibration technique. The open water tests were carried out at low and high Reynolds number according to the ITTC recommendations with unit total configuration and the interaction effect between propeller and pod housing & strut was studied at different Reynolds numbers. In self-propulsion test, several optimization tests with different direction of rotation, offset distance in beam-wide direction were carried out and each effect on the powering performance were studied. To the powering performance of pod propulsion ship, the correction methods of pod drag proposed by the ITTC guidelines were investigated with the test data and each effect on the final powering performance was evaluated