Solving the wave resistance of a submerged body using the panel method

This paper presents a panel method to evaluate the wave resistance on a submerged body moving beneath a free surface. In the process of evaluation, the double integral term in the potential function is replaced by a single integral with the integrand expressed in terms of the complex exponential integral. With such derivation, the numerical computing techniques become available and can then be extended to calculate the wave resistance on a submerged body. Here the sets of the source strength on the panels are solved efficiently by applying the Gaussian elimination method incorporated with the partial pivoting technique. It is found that use of these techniques incorporated with a suitable body mesh distribution can lead to satisfactory results which agree with those obtained using other methods and experimental data. The present paper offers another tool to solve the wave resistance of a submerged body moving beneath a free surface, which is very useful for the design of certain underwater vehicles.