Numerical Investigation of Sloshing in a Tank: Statistical Description of Experiments and CFD Calculations

Numerical study of liquid dynamics in an LNG tank is presented. The available data from large scale (1:10) sloshing experiments of 2D section of an LNG carrier reveal large scatter in recorded values of peak pressures. The experimental data is analysed from statistical point of view in order to obtain distributions of the pressure peaks. Then the entire experimental data record is reproduced numerically by CFD simulations and it is shown that pressure peaks obtained numerically display scatter of values as well. A statistical description of the numerically obtained record is provided and compared with description derived from the experimental data. The applied CFD code ComFLOW solves Navier-Stokes equations and uses an improved Volume of Fluid (iVOF) method to track movement of fluid’s free surface. Two different fluid models, single-phase (liquid+void) and two-phase (liquid+compressible gas) can be applied, the latter model being capable of simulating bubbles and gas entrapped in liquid. For low tank filling rate discussed in the paper (10%) the single-phase approach is sufficient. Comparison of statistical properties of experimental and numerical records is offered.