Abstract
A device that consists of an array of hydrofoils (called a vane deployer) is widely used in ocean engineering. In general, the vane deployer has to spread out efficiently, which is possible by enhancing the lift-to-drag ratio. In the present study, using a computational fluid dynamics, we investigate the effect of hydrofoil arrangement on the lift-to-drag ratio to establish the condition in which a reasonable level of constant lift-to-drag ratio is achieved in a wide range of angle of attack, to avoid a degradation of the hydrodynamic performance. First, the flow around two-dimensional hydrofoil array is examined by varying the size of hydrofoil components, gap between the hydrofoils, and arrangement type. As a result, we determine the optimized hydrofoil array configuration whose lift-to-drag ratio is nearly independent on the angle of attack. Finally, a three-dimensional simulation is performed for the optimized geometry to estimate the performance of actual vane deployer.