Numerical study on anti-sloshing performance of vertical baffles in underwater vehicle buoyancy regulators considering fluid interconnection

This study proposed a numerical method to investigate the anti-sloshing performance of vertical and gapped baffles in an underwater vehicle buoyancy regulator ballast tank under the violent sloshing condition. Under the violent sloshing conditions, when the baffle is shorter than the static free surface height, it has limited exhibit damping and insufficient energy dissipation, which could cause some sustained high wave peaks. An increment of the baffle height can reduce the hydraulic jump magnitudes and change the bulk swirling wave into two independent diagonal-like wave pairs; thus, it can effectively suppress the double-peak phenomenon. The gaps can induce the flow separation, which causes the paired high-speed vortices to dissipate the kinetic energy and reduce the peak wave heights. Based on the sloshing amplification factor Rn, a new index ASI is applied to reflect the resistance of the baffle against the free surface deformation.