Evaluation of Turbulence Models for the Numerical Simulation of Supercavitating Flows Around a Hydrofoil

Supercavitating flows around a hydrofoil is simulated to grasp the unsteady behaviour numerically. To evaluate the application of turbulence models in the computations of supercavitating flows, three different models are implemented: standard κ-ε model, RNG κ-ε model and SSG Reynolds stress model. And then, numerical results were compared to experimental ones. The results showed that the standard κ-ε model can only simulate the steady supercavitating behavior. However, both the RNG κ-ε model and SSG Reynolds stress model can obtain two-phase mixture characteristics in the cavity area, especially the reverse fluctuating processes of the interface between the vapor phase and water-vapor mixture phase. It is also noted that the maximum cavity length simulated by the RNG κ-ε model agrees well with the experimental one.