Effect of water-filled cabins on explosion resistance for ship side structure

The explosion resistance design of side structures plays a critical role in ship engineering, influencing not only the safety and stability of the vessel but also the lives and economic interests of the crew. This paper aims to investigate the impact of water-filled cabins on structural explosion resistance. A side multi-cabin model was designed and fabricated, and experimental research was conducted to assess the explosion resistance of the water-filled outer cabin under near-field underwater explosions. The strain and deflection of the model were analyzed. Additionally, the structural damage to the side multi-cabin model under near-field underwater explosions was simulated using the Structured-Arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian (S-ALE) method. This numerical approach verified the reliability of the experimental results. Using the validated numerical simulation, we further studied the explosion resistance of the side multi-cabin model, both with and without the water-filled outer cabin. We also examined the propagation characteristics of explosion pressure in the liquid and its influence on the damage process of the protective structure. The findings demonstrate that the water-filled outer cabin significantly mitigates the propagation of underwater explosion pressure and structural deformation, reducing explosion pressure propagation by approximately 3% and side-plate deflection by approximately 70%.