NUMERICAL SIMULATION AND RESPONSE STUDY OF VERTICAL CYLINDER UNDER BREAKING WAVES

Offshore structures are continuously exposed to extremely varying aerodynamic and hydrodynamic loads. The storm waves and breaking waves may cause significant impact on coastal and offshore structures such as vertical sea wall, wind turbines, LNG carriers and submarine pipelines etc. The prediction of the breaking wave impact pressure is the important aspect in the design of those structures. The breaking wave forces produce the highest hydrodynamic loads on substructures in shallow water, predominantly plunging breaking waves. Owing to the complex and transient nature of the impact forces it requires more details concerning the physics of breaking waves and nature of wave interaction with those structures. In this paper, A Piston-type wave generator was incorporated in the computational domain to generate waves. Flow 3D was used for simulating 3D numerical wave tank. The desired breaking waves are simulated using the concept of wave focusing using Flow 3D solver. These waves are made to impinge on the elastic circular cylinders of different materials such as PVC, timber and concrete by varying the support conditions such as cantilever, both ends fixed, inclined support with 30º inclination. The hydrodynamic response and the structural response are analysed and validated with the experimental literatures. The maximum impact pressure transpired on the cylinder due to plunging wave impact from numerical simulation is found to be eight times of the non-breaking waves.