Hydrofoils and propellers

Lectures: 2 sessions / week, 2 hours / session

Recitations: 1 session / week, 1 hour / session

This course develops the theory and design of hydrofoil sections, including lifting and thickness problems for sub-cavitating sections, unsteady flow problems, and computer-aided design of low drag cavitation-free sections. It also covers lifting line and lifting surface theory with applications to hydrofoil craft, rudder, control surface, propeller and wind turbine rotor design. Other topics include computer-aided design of wake adapted propellers; steady and unsteady propeller thrust and torque; performance analysis and design of wind turbine rotors in steady and stochastic wind; and numerical principles of vortex lattice and lifting surface panel methods. Projects illustrate the development of computational methods for lifting, propeller and wind turbine flows, and use of state-of-the-art simulation methods for lifting, propulsion and wind turbine applications.

This course uses notes developed by Prof. Jake Kerwin in past years.

Kerwin, Justin. Lecture Notes on Hydrofoils and Propellers. Cambridge, MA, January 2001. (PDF - 3.4 MB) (Courtesy of Prof. Justin Kerwin. Used with permission.)

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Homework 5 due

Homework 6 out

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