Anti-slosh effect of a horizontal porous baffle in a swaying/rolling rectangular tank: Analytical and experimental approaches

Abstract

The horizontal porous baffle and its effect as an anti-slosh device have been investigated intensively in a swaying and rolling rectangular tank. To accurately assess the level at which porous baffles reduce liquid sloshing, the Matched Eigenfunction Expansion Method (MEEM) has been utilized as an analytical tool. The velocity potentials in the horizontal baffle-covered fluid region are expressed by the sum of the homogeneous and particular solutions to avoid solving the complex dispersion equation. By applying an equivalent linearized quadratic loss model, the nonlinear algebraic equation is derived and solved by implementing the Newton–Raphson iterative scheme. To prove the validity of the present theoretical model, a series of experiments have been conducted with different centered horizontal porous baffles with varying porosities and submerged depths in a swaying and rolling rectangular tank. Reasonably good agreements are obtained regarding the analytical solutions and the experiment's findings. The influence of porosity, submerged depth, and length of a centered horizontal porous baffle on anti-slosh performance have been analyzed, especially at resonance modes. The developed predictive tool can potentially provide guidelines for optimal design of the horizontal porous baffle.