Numerical and experimental investigation of the hydrodynamics of flapping foil added in-line motion

The flapping foil based on bionics is a sort of simplified model which imitates the motion of the wings or fins of animals. Based on the backgrounds of underwater vehicle with high capabilities of propulsion, the hydrodynamics of flapping foil added in-line motion is numerical and experimental investigated in this paper. We simulate this 3 DOF motion in the method of computational fluid dynamics. The synthetic effect of the heave amplitude, Strouhal number, attack angle, and the stroke angle on the propulsive efficiency are investigated by the response surface methodology (RSM). We obtain a prediction model of the propulsive efficiency depended on the four parameters and design a 3 DOF experimental setup with the aim of investigating the propulsion mechanism of the flapping hydrofoils and analysis the hydrodynamic forces generated on the hydrofoils.