Beat Rodrguez Julen Garca

What is Aqwa?
Aqwa is a software included in Ansys
Is an engineering toolset designed to simulate the effects of wave,

wind and current on both floating and fixed offshore structures The Hydrodynamic Diffraction tool enables the developing of the primary hydrodynamic parameters required for the analysis of motions and responses It is also possible to generate pressure and inertial loading The purpose of this work is to guide new users throughout their first steps of the learning of the program

Modules
Aqwa Line Regular waves Aqwa Graphical Supervisor Graphical Supervisor AqwaWave Structural FEM analysis AqwaWorkbench Used to create an element based model from geometry defined in Ansys Design Modeler, apply AQWA specific input and view results It is the one analyzed in this guide

1. Creating the geometry

AqwaWorkbench (AQWAWB) requires a geometry fully

compatible with the program For that purpose, some operations will be carried out in the AnsysWorkbench (do not confuse with Aqwawb) Open Ansys Workbench In Ansys Workbench, select Geometry in Component Systems of the Toolbox That will open a new box with an empty geometry. Double-clicking on the question mark will open the Ansys Design Modeler (DM)

1. Creating the geometry

Once in the DM, and after selecting the units to work with,

there are two options:

A) Import a geometry already created with a CAD program B) Create a geometry with the DM

Once that is done, some operations are needed in the DM in

order to make the geometry compatible with AQWAWB Just for basic tutorial purposes, the creation of a simple cylinder in the DM is briefly explained here

1. Creating the geometry

DM CAD tool is simple, but with a little extra work, simple-

medium geometries can be created For learning purposes, a generic cylinders creation will be explained. Later, with experience, some tricks can be used to make it quicker the fulfillment of the subsequent compatibility conditions The cylinder is pretended to be a vertical offshore energy system

1. Creating the geometry

Will be created a cylinder with the X axis being the longitudinal

one

NOTE: Directly creating a cylinder with the Z axis being the longitudinal one would make the

work easier, but for learning purposes here is designed in another way

The characteristics are [MKS]: Length: 15 Diameter: 4 Cylinder density: 600 Water density: 1028 So, with basic fluid's theory (not explained here): Draft: 8.75 [Draft=Length*(cyl/wat)]

1. Creating the geometry

DM has three main windows: Graphics Tree Outline Details view In the tree outline, is important
tree outline

tool bars

graphics

to remark that there are two tabs:

Sketching
details view

Modeling

In the upper part there are some tool bars which include file

management, selection, viewing and operations icons

1. Creating the geometry

NOTE: DMs use is not the aim of this tutorial so just a briefly guide of steps is carried out here.

Anyway, no problems should arise since the geometry is very simple. For further explanation check DM tutorials

Select YZPlane and click in the blue icon of the tools bar name New

sketch It is important to understand that every plane, body always has a blue arrow pointing its normal direction Sketch1 will appear in YZPlane. Select it and click in the Sketching tab of the Tree outline Select Circle and click on the coordinate origin Move the mouse and click to select its diameter (select a random one)

1. Creating the geometry

In the Sketching tab, below all the drawings (line, circle,

ellipse), click on dimensions Select Diameter and click on the created circle In Details View window set D1 to 4 In the tools bar click on the Generate icon (a yellow thunder) in order to integrate the new sketch in the geometry Click on the Extrude icon of the tools bar Extrude1 should appear in the Tree Outline In Details view window click on the box which is to the right of Base Object

1. Creating the geometry

Select Sketch1 either in the Tree Outline or directly in the

Graphics window, and click Apply In FD1, Depth (>0) input 15 Click on Generate With this, the creation of the cylinder is completed We could have also reached this point importing a CAD geometry: File/Import External Geometry File Now, the compatibility requirements fulfillment will be explained
and set the values that make directly the XYPlane coincident with Global Water Axis

NOTE: It would have been better to change, in Direction, from Normal to Both Asymmetric

2. General modeling requirements

Requirements: Only Lines and Surfaces are processed (not Bodies) Surfaces must have normals pointing outwards The model is oriented Z axis vertical up The model has to be split at the water line Each structure should be a part

2. General modeling requirements

The structure is a Body. It can be looked in Tree Outline, that below 1

Part, 1 Body there is one Solid It has to be a surface. For this purpose, select Thin/Surface of the tools bar Thin1 should appear in Tree Outline In Details View, in Selection Type select Bodies Only Click on the box to the right of Geometry and then on the Body. Then click Apply In FD1, Thickness (>=0) input 0 and click on Generate Now, in 1 Part, 1 Body there is one Surface Body
name would be Thin2 even if now there is no Thin1

NOTE: If you create an operation, i.e. Thin1, and then you delete it, when creating a new one, its

2. General modeling requirements

Structures longitudinal axis must be on the Z axis For that purpose a rotation and a translation must be carried out.

This is done via Body Operation Click on Create/Body Operation BodyOp1 should appear in the Tree Outline In Details View, in type select Rotate In Bodies select our body like done previously In Axis Definition select Components The rotation axis is Y, and the required angle is 90, so in the components put 0, 1 and 0. And the angle 90

2. General modeling requirements

Now, the translation is required
AQWAWB requires that the draft line is at the fixed reference

axis. XYPlane will always be the draft line Since our structure has a length of 15 and a draft of 8.75, the structure has to be translated 6.25 units in the Z+ axis (=158.75) So, a new plane is required in order to make the operation Click on Create/New Plane Plane4 should appear in the Tree Outline

2. General modeling requirements

In Details View, select XYPlane as Base Plane, in Transform1

(RBD) Select Offset Z and input 6.25 as a value

NOTE: The international version of the program uses comma [,] and not period [.] as decimal

separator, so input 6,25

Click on Generate to proceed

Now, perform a new Body Operation, BodyOp5, of type

Move, where the source plane is XYPlane and destination plane is Plane4

2. General modeling requirements

When clicking in XYPlane and rotating the view, will be easy to

see the how the draft line goes through the right place Now, the surface must be split at the draft line For that purpose, it is required to freeze and then split the structure. This is used with Freeze and Slice First, click on Tools/Freeze Then, click on Create/Slice Slice1 should appear in Tree Outline

2. General modeling requirements

Select XYPlane as base plane and generate After this, 2 Parts/ 2 Bodies appear in Tree Outline with 2

Surface Body-s below it One of the requirements is that the structure has to be a single part. In order to achieve this, hold the control key while clicking on both Surface Body-s Free control key, right-click on the selection and select Form New Part This completes the procedure. The structure is ready

2. General modeling requirements

There are two concepts to understand: One thing is saving the work of the interface. It is done in the DM: File/Save Project, or directly in the AnsysWorkbench: File/Save (.wbpj) But the file imported by AQWAWB has another extension (.agdb). It is exported from the DM by clicking on File/Export The .agdb file is the one to import from AQWAWB Set its name: aqwawbguide1

3. Importing the geometry

Open AQWAWB
AQWAWB has three main windows: Graphics Outline outline Details Output
details tools bars

graphics

output

In the upper part there are some tool bars which include file

management, selection, viewing and operations icons

3. Importing the geometry

For importing the geometry right-click on Geometry and select

Insert Geometry and From File

Import aqwawbguide.agdb from where you saved it After some time the bar will reach the 100% and if there is no error

the geometry should appear very small in the Graphics window There are three elements in the Graphics window:
A big dark-grey square (the bottom of the sea) A very small cylinder (the structure) A big light-grey square dividing the cylinder (the water line)

For viewing purposes, click on Part and select Zoom to Fit on the

tools bar (the magnifier with a blue box inside) to fit the zoom to the cylinder

3. Importing the geometry

4. Pre-processing I: The geometry

Click on Geometry in Outline window. In Details window, there

are some options needed to know The sea level must coincide with where the surface is split The depth of the sea can be defined. For the analysis it will be fixed to 500. Is an important variable since the results will depend on it and, as it will be explained later, frequency range will be determined by this The density of the water is a function of the temperature. In Europe is 1028 is the most common, being 1026 the standard for USA. In this analysis will be set to 1028
NOTE: Remember that the units are already set. Of course Kg/m^3

The size of the water will affect the display and

will be 1000 for either X and Y

4. Pre-processing I: The geometry

Click on Part in Outline window.
In this section it is possible to show or hide the geometry using

Part Visibility and decide if the geometry will take part in the analysis or not via Part Activity. In the analysis, the part will be active and visible Also, it is possible to fix the structure or let it free to move (what is done in this analysis). No internal lid is required here, but could be useful, for instance, in a moon pool No linear damping is required

4. Pre-processing I: The geometry

Now, click on the first Surface Body (check that only the part

below the water is now green)

NOTE: if the below water part is the second one, select that second Surface Body

Its required to have the below water surface as a diffracting

surface, and the one above the water as a non-diffracting one. This is done with Surface Type Structure Type must be set as a Physical geometry in the analyzed structure Now, the mass and inertias must be included Click on Part and then, in the upper bar, select Add/Point Mass

4. Pre-processing I: The geometry

Physical characteristics of the cylinder are: Mass: 113097 [Mass=Density*Volume] Inertias:

For generic cylinder with z axis longitudinal

Ix=(1/2)*M*(R^2) Iy=Iz=(1/12)*M*{[3*(R^2)]+(L^2)} Iyz=(1/12)*M*(L^2) Ixy=Izx=(1/4)*M*(R^2) Ix=226194 Iy=Iz=2233666 Iyz=2120569 Ixy=Izx=113097

For this guides cylinder:

4. Pre-processing I: The geometry

Click on Point Mass In Mass Definition change it to Manual and set it to 113097 The inertia can be input directly or using the radius of gyration as

can be seen in Define inertia values by. Using Direct input of inertia:

Ixx=226194 Ixy=113097 Ixz=113097 Iyy=2233666 Iyz=2120569 Izz=2233666

4. Pre-processing I: The geometry

It is important that X, Y and Z are selected so that the

Point Mass is applied right into the mass centre of the cylinder. For this example, Z is required to be -1.25 [=(Length/2)-Draft] Point Buoyancy and Disc can also be included
Point Buoyancy requires a position and a volume Disc can be used to create an area that has drag and added mass in

the direction perpendicular to the disc

With this work, the geometry is done and we are ready to set the

Mesh

5. Pre-processing II: The mesh

Click on Mesh In Meshing Type the algorythm used for the mesh generation can be

controled. It works nice as Program Controlled but if any problem arised, change it to adjust it to the required geometry There are 2 variables which can be changed:
Defeaturing Tolerance (how small the details are treated) Max Element Size (maximum size of an ellement)

Note that Max Allowed Frequency is inversely proportional to Max

Element Size It is required that:

Defeaturing tolerance < 0.6 * Max element size No. Of Elements < 18000 (of which diffracting < 12000)

5. Pre-processing II: The mesh

For our analysis, set: Defeaturing Tolerance: 0.8 Max Element Size: 1.4 If you click in Mesh and then in the upper bar select Insert

Mesh Control/Sizing, a new option is avaible This option enables the refinement of a mesh on any given part or body, by enabling a smaller element size to be associated to the geometry. Will not be used in this guide.
NOTE: In case you added it, it is possible to delete it by right-clicking it and selecting Delete.

Note that Supress also deletes it, but by unsupressing it, becomes avaible again

5. Pre-processing II: The mesh

Once it is all set, click on Generate Mesh (yellow thunder)
After a while (large time if the selected size is too small), the

mesh will be generated To view it, click on Part,then in ZoomFit (remember, the magnifier with a blue box inside), and then on Mesh Once it is done, it is time to set the analysis

6. Pre-processing III: The analysis

Click on aqwawbguide1 and the on Insert analysis/Hydrodynamic

Diffraction A new icon named Analysis XX should have appeared Click on Analysis Options The Sea Grid Factor controls how much larger the area is than the structure. Set it to 2 In Output File Options there are multyple options to manage the files outputted by AQWAWB. Let all them as No Common analysis options control how the analysis is performed. It is useful to activate Ignore modelling rule violations. Activate it and let the others desactivated

6. Pre-processing III: The analysis

Structure selection tree object enables the definition of

interacting structures Is used to exclude structures that you want to exclude for any particular analysis It also enables the order of solving to be changed For this analysis, do not change anything here Gravity enables the definition of gravity It should not be changed in most cases

6. Pre-processing III: The analysis

Click on Wave Directions
It is possible to add a forward speed to the structure, but if that is done, only

a single wave direction can be analyzed. We will not use it Waves are automatically created in -180 and +180 directions It is possible to set the interval between the required directions, or simple put how many intermediate directions are. Selecting too many can make the solving costly. Put 7 intermediate directions It is also possible to add intermediate directions or ranges of directions
NOTE: 0 is always X+

6. Pre-processing III: The analysis

Click on Wave frequencies
It is possible to select either one single frequency or a range of them. Select

Range It is required to set the starting and ending frenquency Approximate requirements:
Start Frequency > 0.16 / (Water Depth)^0.5 End Frequency < 0.51 / (Max Element Size)^0.5 End Frencuency > 1.1 Start Frequency

Set Start Frequency to 0.10 and End Frequency to 0.40 Also, add 12 intermediate values Of course, period is the inverse of the frequency so any change in one of

them would affect the other

7. Processing
There are two analysis options for a Hydrodynamic Diffraction analysis:

either to calculate the Hydrostatics only, or to calculate the full Hydrodynamic results Typically, you will first do the first one if you are not sure of the preprocessing and want to check for errors in a quick solving, or simply if you just require the hydrostatics The solving is done by clicking on Analysis XX and then on Solve or Solve Hydrostatics Click on Solve You will be able to follow the progress of the analysis through the small window that is opened during the analysis Once it ends, is time to check the results

8. Post-processing
Right-click on Results. Add Hydrostatic, Hydrodynamic Graph and Pressures

and Motions. Click on Part and then on ZoomFit (remember: the magnifier with a small blue box inside) Click on Hydrostatic The Centre of Gravity appears in green (is equal to the Point Mass in this case) The Centre of Buoyancy appears in red The Centre of Floatation appears in blue In Graphics window there is a small tab called Properties Clicking on it, detailed hydrostatics results will appear:
Hydrostatic Displacement Properties, Cut Water

Plane Properties, Small Angles Stability Parameters

8. Post-processing

8. Post-processing
Hydrodynamic Graph enables the plotting of up to 4 comparative graph

results Can be plotted against either Frequency or Period and can be Amplitude or Phase based In Line A select the structure and view how the results operate It is possible to plot different types of results as hydrodynamic coefficients or forces
NOTE: Check theory for the meaning of the different results

For this guide application, just select the RAOs (Response Amplitude

Operators) in Z axis in any direction (Amplitude based against Frequency) and check how, starting from 1 (no amplification), the maximum for this particular case happens close to 0.15 Hz, and then when the frequency is too high the RAOs are negligible Also, add another line to plot how the Diffraction + Froude-Krylov forces in Z axis is smaller when the frequency of the waves increases

8. Post-processing

8. Post-processing
Finally, Pressures and Motions enables the visualization and display of a number of

results generated from AQWA once a hydrodynamic solve has been performed Using Result Selection,all the combination of the analyzed wave types can be selected (waves frequencies and directions) Incident Wave Amplitude can be selected In Result Type can be selected constat ones like Maximum, Minimum or Amplitude, or also Cyclic where just a single phase or a Range of them can be selected (allowing a video output) In Contour Selection both the Preassure (Interpolated or Panel) can be selected. There are options where it is possible to select if the body above the water has Zero Pressure or is simply Dimmed. The pressure can be measured as Head of Water or as Force/Area. There is also the possibility to visualize the Resultant Displacement in Structure ContourType. In both cases, it is possible to visualize or not the waves (Wave ContourType) Component Selection allows the disabling of different parts of the visualization

8. Post-processing
In this guide, the following case will be analyzed: Frequency: 0.22 Direction: 45 Incident Wave Amplitude: 1.5 ResultType: Cyclic Wave Position (Phase): Range No. Of Steps: 60 Structure Contour Type: Interpolated Preassure AboveWater Body Display: Zero Pressure Pressure Measurement: Head of Water Wave ContourType: Wave Height Click on Part and then on ZoomFit. Then click on Pressures and

Motions, and in Outputwindow, below the Graphical window, click on the red Play. A video file (.avi) can be exported

8. Post-processing

Beat Rodrguez (undergraduate scholarship) b.rodriguez.madariaga@gmail.com Julen Garca (undergraduate assistant) jxgarciaibanez@hotmail.com Faculty of Engineering in Bilbao Tecnalia Researching Room