DEVELOPMENT OF AN EXPERIMENTAL METHOD TO ASSESS THE PERFORMANCE OF A HIGH SPEED CRAFT (1ST REPORT) - DEVELOPMENT OF A HIGH SPEED TOWING SYSTEM

An experimental system to measure hydrodynamic forces acting on models of high speed planing craft is developed for a medium sized towing tank of 70m length. The light towing carriage towed by two wires can run up to a peed of 15m/s. The measured forces acting on two fixed models towed by the system are in fairly good agreement with that from the same models in a conventional towing carriage. A simulation of the attitude and resistance of a craft using the database of hydrodynamic forces measured by the system is also carried out and is compared with the result of conventional resistance tests. The comparison shows that the simulation result of the running attitude is in fairly good agreement with the experimental result. The reasons for the deviation of the resistance is explained.