A ship manoeuvring simulator which is designed for training in (and/or redesign of) harbour areas needs to be fed with highly realistic mathematical manoeuvring models that allow the accurate prediction of the ship motions while simulating complex manoeuvres. These manoeuvring models can be designed based on captive model tests carried out in a towing tank. However, when performing such tests, the ship is subjected to possible towing tank wall interaction and thus blockage, a risk that increases with decreasing water depth, increasing ship velocity and increasing obliqueness of the ship with respect to the towing tank’s longitudinal axis. The present paper gives an overview of the research that the authors have carried out in the field and the work to be performed to be able to correctly isolate the open water behaviour of the ship from the captive model test results or mathematical models. The isolation of these effects will enable the correct superposition of the hydrodynamic forces when carrying out manoeuvring simulations in complex harbour environments.
Delefortrie et al. (Wed,) studied this question.