The mechanism of flapping propulsion of an underwater glider

To develop a bionic maneuverable propulsion system to be applied in a small underwater vehicle, a new conceptual design of the bionic propulsion is applied to the traditional underwater glider. The numerical simulation focuses on the autonomous underwater glider(AUG)’s flapping propulsion at Re= 200 by solving the incompressible viscous Navier-Stokes equations coupled with the immersed boundary method. The systematic analysis of the effect of different motion parameters on the propulsive efficiency of the AUG is carried out, including the hydrofoil’s heaving amplitude, the pitching amplitude, the phase lag between heaving and pitching and the flapping frequency. The results obtained in this study can provide some physical insights into the propulsive mechanisms in the flapping-based locomotion.