Ship Technology Research

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A consistent method to design and evaluate the

performance of Anti-Roll Tanks for ships

Geert Kapsenberg & Nicolas Carette

To cite this article: Geert Kapsenberg & Nicolas Carette (2023) A consistent method to design
and evaluate the performance of Anti-Roll Tanks for ships, Ship Technology Research, 70:2,
117-145, DOI: 10.1080/09377255.2022.2117496

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/09377255.2022.2117496

© 2022 Maritime Research Institute

Netherlands. Published by Informa UK
Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group

Published online: 21 Sep 2022.

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SHIP TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH (SCHIFFSTECHNIK)
2023, VOL. 70, NO. 2, 117–145
https://doi.org/10.1080/09377255.2022.2117496

A consistent method to design and evaluate the performance of Anti-Roll

Tanks for ships
Geert Kapsenberg and Nicolas Carette
Maritime Research Institute Netherlands, Wageningen, the Netherlands

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

This article presents practical methods to design an Anti-Roll tank (ART) for a ship and to Received 9 April 2022
predict the performance of the system ship + ART in a sea state. The methods presented are Accepted 22 August 2022
extensions of existing mathematical models. The prediction of the moment exerted by the
KEYWORDS
tanks has been improved and new models for the lateral force have been derived. Instead Anti-Roll tank; effective
of using only the roll angle, a combination of the roll angle and the local lateral acceleration gravity angle; equations of
is used as excitation of the motion of the tank. The main advantage of this combined motion; design method;
parameter is that it accounts for the distance of the tank bottom to the roll axis and the experiment; analytical model
effect of sway. Experimental and CFD methods have been reviewed and results are shown. ; CFD; limits of operation
Limits of the use of the U and FS-type of ART are separately discussed and quantified. The
procedure is demonstrated by a design example.

1. Introduction describe the physics in the tanks became available.

1.1. Historical context
The roll motion of a ship has been experienced as a
problem when changing from sail to steam propul-
sion. The large amount of damping generated by the
sails was not appreciated as it should and the first
ships without sails rolled heavily. The problem was
addressed in the famous paper of W. Froude On the
rolling of ships (1861). It was then clear that devices
must be installed on the ship to increase the damping
for this mode of motion, and not much later the first
report on the use of an Anti-Roll Tank (ART)
appeared. Watts (1883) tested a free surface tank on
board the HMS Inflexible during a series of voyages.
The tank was not especially designed for this ship, it
was just fitted in the available space, and the working
principles of the device were not yet fully understood.
Watts concluded that the ART reduced the roll angle
some 20–25%, while rather large bilge keels would
have been necessary for the same effect. He rightly
concluded that the effect of the tank is quickly limited
due to saturation, while bilge keels would create more
damping for increasing wave amplitudes. Frahm
(1911) continued the ART development; he designed
a new type of tank: the U-type. He based his design
on a series of scientific assumptions, among which
that the tank should be in resonance with the natural
roll period of the ship.
Big steps forward in the design and application of
the ART were made when analytical models to
Especially the models developed by Verhagen and
Wijngaarden (1965) for the free surface tank, and by
Stigter (1966) for the U-tank, were important mile-
stones. Stigter also spent quite some attention on the
coupled motion of the ship equipped with an ART.
It was recognized that the centre of rotation of the
tank has an important effect on its generated moment.
In the same period, a very useful series of experiments
using a FS tank was carried out by van den Bosch and
Vugts (1966a, 1966b).
The real challenge is in the prediction of the
motions of the coupled ART – ship system. The clas-
sical approach is to derive a roll damping and a roll
restoring coefficient from the response of the ART
and to add these to the equation for the roll motion
of the ship. The response of the ART is determined
through either an analytical model or through bench
tests. These coefficients are dependent on the vertical
distance of the centre of gravity of the ship (CoG) to
the bottom of the tank. Other solutions are based on
the approach for sloshing problems; the hydrodyn-
amics of the ship and the tank are modelled in a diffr-
action code and the coupled equations are solved,
Malenica et al. (2003). However, these methods
necessitate the use of a tuning factor to avoid excessive
response of the ART at resonance. This factor can
hardly be predicted in a design phase, Journee
(1997). The most recent studies use non-linear sea-
keeping time domain codes for the ship motions
coupled with CFD models for the tank response

CONTACT Nicolas Carette n.carette@marin.nl Maritime Research Institute Netherlands, Wageningen, the Netherlands
This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.
© 2022 Maritime Research Institute Netherlands. Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-
nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or
built upon in any way.
118 G. KAPSENBERG AND N. CARETTE

(van Daalen et al. 2000; Souto Iglesias et al. 2004; Bun- 1.3. Nomenclature
nik and Veldman 2010; Diebold et al. 2016), but at the
price of computationally intensive calculations. Nomenclature,
general
Since quite some time, the design of an ART is
g [m/s2] Acceleration due to gravity
verified by performing bench tests. During such an L [m] Length of the ART (in the ship
experiment, a model of the tank is fitted on an oscil- longitudinal direction)
lating table, and the reaction forces are being B [m] Width of the ART (in the ship transversal
direction)
measured as a function of the motion frequency D [m] Height of the ART (in the ship vertical
and amplitude. The tank is normally positioned at a direction)
p [Pa] Fluid pressure
vertical distance from the rotation axis of the table x, y, z [m] Linear wave induced displacements of
similar to the vertical distance of the tank to the the CoG of the ship
xART, yART, zART [m] Position of the reference point of the ART
CoG of the ship. Since the sixties and seventies of relative to the CoG of the ship
the last century, the combination of vessel and ART ε [rad] Phase angle of the force or moment
produced by the tank relative to the
is also tested in a wave basin to verify the effect in motion
selected sea states. ρ [kg/m3] Specific mass of the fluid in the tank
The objective of this article is to present practical ω [rad/s] Oscillation frequency
f, u , c [rad] Angular wave induced displacements of
methods to design an anti-roll tank and to predict the ship around respectively the X, Y
the performance of the system ship + ART in a sea and Z axis.
w [rad] Tank excitation angle EGA
state. These methods include the effect of lateral Nomenclature, U-tank
accelerations, the non-linear response of the tank h [m] Height of the duct of a U-tank
n [m] Local width of the U-tank, perpendicular
and saturation of the tank. To achieve this, the to the s-coordinate
model of Stigter and the model of Verhagen and v [m/s] Fluid velocity along the s-coordinate of
the U-tank
van Wijngaarden have been extended to also predict s [m] Coordinate along the U-tank centre of
the lateral force produced by the tank. The models the duct and reservoir. (s = 0 at plane
were improved to use a more complete driving par- of symmetry, positive in negative Y-
direction)
ameter for the tank motions. The roll angle and the w1..3 [m] Geometrical dimensions of the U-tank,
local lateral acceleration have been combined to a see Figure 7.
Nomenclature, FS-tank
single parameter, the Effective Gravity Angle h0 [m] Water level at rest in a FS-tank
(EGA). The use of this parameter allows the correct h1 [m] Water level in front of the bore in an
active FS-tank
prediction of the non-linear force and moment of h2 [m] Water level behind the bore in an active
the ART for any location on the ship, using for FS-tank
v [m/s] Fluid velocity in the FS-tank
instance the results of bench tests for only one axis λ [m] Actual water level in the FS-tank
of rotation. A complication is that the coupling of
the tank force and moment to the equations of
motion of the ship needs to be changed into an
iterative procedure; this aspect is also detailed in 1.4. Reference system
the presented study. The motions of the Anti-Roll Tank fluid and the forces
produced by it are defined in a right-handed reference
1.2. Design philosophy system, Figure 1, fixed to the ART. The X-axis is posi-
tive forward, the Y-axis is positive to port-side and the
The methodology to design an Anti-Roll tank advo- Z-axis is positive upwards. The origin O is located at
cated in this article is to use the analytical models the mid-length, symmetry plane and the bottom of
for the U-tank and the Free Surface tank that are the anti-roll tank. This system is used for as well the
described in Ch. 3 and Ch. 4. A choice for the Free Surface Tank as the U-tank.
required internal damping of the tank should be The reference condition is the ‘frozen’ tank con-
based on considerations related to the operating dition. This means that the force, the moment and
conditions and the limits of the tank (Ch. 8). The the phase angle are defined zero for the infinite fre-
design of the ART should be verified by coupling quency limit. The ‘frozen’ mass of the water should
the database containing the force and moment pro- be included in the mass and inertia of the vessel.
duced by the tank to a ship motion programme
using the method described in Ch 9. If this result
is satisfactory, the design of the tank can be detailed 2. Fundamentals of anti roll tanks
using CFD (Ch 6.) or using experimental methods
2.1. Physics
(Ch. 7). In particular, the baffles can be designed
to provide the required internal damping for the The purpose of fitting an anti-roll tank into a ship is
U-tank. The procedure is illustrated by an example to increase the roll damping, and thereby reducing
ART design for a yacht, Ch. 10. the roll motion, rather than modifying the stability

Figure 1. Anti-roll tank reference systems for Free Surface tank (left) and U-tank (right).
of the ship to shift its resonance frequency. The ART
is essentially a separate mass-damper-spring system
added to the ship. The damping that the system gen-
erates is proportional to the product of the moment it
generates and the roll velocity of the ship. Therefore,
the efficiency of the system is at maximum when the
maximum moment is in-phase with the roll velocity,
which means that it has a 90 deg phase shift with the
roll motion.
There are two basic designs for an ART, the U-
tank and the Free-Surface tank. To produce the
required moment, both ART designs rely on res-
onant water motions. Both tanks will reduce the
roll around the resonance frequency but increase it
elsewhere (see Figure 4). The physics of both tanks
are fundamentally non-linear. The response,
moment divided by excitation amplitude, is largest
for small values of the excitation (Figure 2). The
response of the tank can be reduced by applying
internal damping, e.g. water or air flow restrictions.
The amount of internal damping is a critical aspect
of the design of the tank as it determines the upper
limit of the operating range.
The Free Surface tank is usually a rectangular
reservoir that is filled with a relatively small amount
of water. Its working principle relies on a travelling
wave bore created by the tank oscillations. The vel-
ocity of the bore is a function of the water depth
Figure 2. Moment (at resonance) produced by a U-type ART
compared to the same for a FS-tank. The moment has been
normalized by the maximum moment at a 1 deg excitation
angle. The different types of tanks show an identical degree
of non-linearity.
SHIP TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH 119
and this, combined with the width of the tank, deter-
mines the natural period of the tank. The height of
the bore is quite significant for low amplitudes of
oscillation and does only slowly increase for increas-
ing amplitudes. A first limit of the tank is reached
when the rotation angle is such that one side of the
tank is dry; a second limit is reached when the pile-
up of water created during the impact of the bore
at the side interacts with the top of the tank. These
phenomena ‘de-tune’ the tank such that the damping
effect decreases quite quickly. Internal damping cre-
ated with bulkheads and baffles can reduce these
effects, but they will strongly reduce the height of
the bore. However, such structures can be necessary
to reduce either the noise level of the tank or the
risk of damage due to the impact of the bore against
the side of the tank.
The principle of the U-tank is based on resonance
of oscillating water columns in two reservoirs on both
sides of the ship connected by a duct. The duct is
connected to the lowest point of the reservoirs, giving
the tank a U-shape. Ventilation at the top of the
reservoirs is necessary, this is done with either vents
to the outside or a second duct connecting the top
of the reservoirs. In contrast to a free surface tank,
a U-tank can be actively controlled by temporarily
closing the water or air duct to increase the period
of its peak response. A control valve in the air duct
is usually chosen for practical reasons. The valve
can also be used to switch the tank completely off.
The limits of this type of tank are reached when
one reservoir is empty at some stage and air flows
into the connecting duct, or when the fluid hits the
top of the reservoir.
A big difference between the U-tank and the FS-
tank is the frequency range in which the tank is
effective. The passive U-tank has a very narrow
response curve; it is only effective in a small fre-
quency range. An example of typical responses of
the two tanks is given in Figure 3. The roll response
of a vessel is in general quite narrow, but the
response of a passive U-tank is often narrower
still. A second difference is that a free surface tank
has a much larger free surface effect (reduction of
metacentric height) than a U-tank. Finally, a
120 G. KAPSENBERG AND N. CARETTE
Figure 3. Response of a FS-tank and a U-tank. The moment
has been normalized by the maximum value of the moment
at resonance.
practical difference is that the U-tank is silent, and
the FS-tank is noisy.
The fact that ART’s work very well at low exci-
tation levels make them very useful to increase the
operability of a vessel with very stringent roll criteria,
but due to their decreasing performance with
increasing motions, they are not suitable to reduce
the extreme values of the roll motion. In practice
this means that an ART should always be used
together with bilge keels. Bilge keels are increasingly
more effective at larger amplitudes, the limit is only
reached when they surface. A second property of
the ART is, that it responds to the ship motions
only, independent of the sailing speed and the
environmental conditions. It is thus one of the few
devices that works as well at zero as at forward
speed Figure 4.
2.2. The driving parameter
Originally the roll motion was used as the driving par-
ameter for the fluid motions in the tank, and thereby
the tank reaction forces. It was soon realized that the
vertical position of the tank in the ship was also an
important parameter; bench tests were carried out
using the actual position of the ART relative to the
CoG of the ship. Although mathematically the roll
Figure 4. Roll response in beam seas, zero speed, of a vessel
with and without ART.
motion is defined as the rotation around the CoG of
the ship, a fixed position of a roll axis does not exist.
In fact, when a point having zero lateral velocity
(used as definition of the roll axis) is considered
during a roll motion, it varies greatly in vertical
position.
More recently it was realized that the real driving
parameter is a combination of the local lateral accel-
eration and the roll angle as expressed by the Effective
Gravity Angle (EGA), Carette (2015). This EGA is
defined as:
y¨ − zART f̈ + xART c̈
wEGA = f + [rad] (1)
g
This approach properly adds the effect of the lat-
eral acceleration due to the sway motion and the
induced effect due to the roll and yaw motions.
Combining these motion components in this single
parameter is essential to correctly account for the
non-linear response of the ART. The validity of
this EGA concept was demonstrated by using the
results of van den Bosch and Vugts (1966a) who
measured the moment produced by FS-tanks when
they were oscillated around a rotation point that
varied in height relative to the bottom of the tank.
Using the results measured for the rotation point
at the bottom of the tank, zART/B = 0, the exper-
imental results at different zART/B values could be
reproduced accurately, Figure 5. An even more
direct validation was carried out by Carette (2015);
he carried out pure roll bench tests (rotation point
at the bottom of the tank) and pure sway bench
tests with exactly the same EGA value and compared
the moment and phase angle produced by the tank.
The resulting time traces of lateral force and roll
moment compared spot-on, Figure 6, as demon-
strated by Carette (2015).
The concept of the EGA to determine the ART reac-
tion forces is used in this publication from now on.
Figure 5. Results of bench tests (symbols) for a FS-tank as
published by van den Bosch and Vugts (1966a). The distance
of the rotation point zr, made non-dimensional by using the
width B of the tank, relative to the bottom of the tank has
been varied. The lines are calculated results using the results
of the zr/B = 0 experiments and the EGA concept.
 SHIP TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH 121

continued halfway the width of the reservoir to the

surface. This appeared to result in inaccurate predic-
tions of the natural frequency of the tank. Results of
CFD calculations showed that a better choice could
be made for the integration path.
. A new model was developed for the lateral force
produced by the tank.

Stigter derives the equations of motion starting

from Newton’s law. The time derivative of the velocity
v along the integration path, Figure 7, is:
dv ∂v ∂v 1 ∂p
= +v =− [m/s2 ] (2)
dt ∂t ∂s r ∂s

Figure 6. Results of experiments with a FS-tank on a moving The parameters in this equation are defined in the
platform. Pure roll experiments (green line) are compared to nomenclature, Ch. 1.3. Since the duct has a constant
pure sway experiments (blue line). The comparison is based cross-section and assuming incompressibility of the
on an identical EGA values (EGA = 1 deg) for both motions. fluid, the velocity does not change in magnitude in
Results from Carette (2015). the duct, so:
∂v
=0 [s−1 ] (3)
∂s
3. Analytical model for the U-tank
Expressing the changes in the water level of the reser-
3.1. Model for the lateral force and the roll voirs as a change in the angle ψ, Figure 7, and consid-
moment of the U-tank ering continuity of mass we have:
A mathematical model for the moment around the ∂v w2 w3
longitudinal axis produced by a U-tank has been = c̈ [m/s2 ] (4)
∂t 2n
developed by Stigter (1966). His model assumes
that the dynamics of the tank are governed by the The double dot used for c̈ indicates the second time
dynamics in the duct connecting the two reservoirs. derivative of parameter ψ. Parameter w3 is defined as:
This is the case when the cross-section of the duct is w3 = w + w2 [m] (5)
considerably smaller than that of the reservoirs, and
thus the velocities and accelerations in the fluid The spatial pressure gradient is governed by the effects
considerably higher. In elaborating the equations of gravity, friction of the fluid along the wall of the
of motion for the fluid in the duct, Stigter only con-
sidered the lateral acceleration in the duct resulting
from the roll angle. He also assumed that the fric-
tion in the duct is proportional to the velocity,
which makes his model fully linear with respect to
the amplitude of the excitation. It is straightforward
to adapt this to a friction in the duct that is pro-
portional to the square of the velocity and to use
a linearized value in the solution of the equations
of motion.
The original model, as developed by Stigter (1966),
was adapted on the following aspects:

. The lateral acceleration in the duct is not only due

to the roll acceleration, but to the combination of
the roll acceleration and the local lateral accelera-
tion. These components are combined in the
EGA. The roll angle w in the equations of Stigter
has been replaced by the parameter wEGA .
. In developing the equations of motion, Stigter chose
Figure 7. Illustration of the parameters used by Stigter (1966)
an integration path starting on the centre line halfway to describe the dimensions and the motions of the U-tank. The
the height of the duct. The integration followed a line dashed line in the middle of the reservoirs and duct, indicated
until halfway the width of the reservoirs, it then as s-axis, is the integration path used by Stigter.
122 G. KAPSENBERG AND N. CARETTE

duct and inertial forces due to the motions of the ship.

If this is elaborated, for details see Stigter (1966), this
results in:

w2 w3 1 ∂p w2 w3 ċ
c̈ = − −k + g cos 11
2n r ∂s 2n2
− rf̈ sin 12 (6)

Integrating this along the s-coordinate and assuming

small motions so that integrals along the s-coordinate
can be taken from and up to the equilibrium level, this
results in:
w2 w3 E1 c̈ + k w2 w3 E2 ċ + g w3 c + 2F2 ẅ
Figure 8. Result of CFD calculations on a U-tank with rounded
(top) and sharp (bottom) corner between duct and reservoir.
The figure shows the vorticity around the X-axis (Kerkvliet
et al. 2014).

+ g w3 w
inertia of the mass of the fluid moving from the PS
=0 (7)
to the SB reservoir. This mass mMOV is determined by:
with:
mMOV = rLw2 w3 c [kg] (10)

sr   
ds w 1 2y − h
E1 = = + 1 + ln 1 + [−]
0 n 2h a h + 2w1 /a

sr  
ds w + 2h 1 2y − h
E2 = = + [m−1 ]
0 n
2 2h2 a2 (y + w1 /a)(h + 2w1 /a)

sr  
′ w + w1 aR′
F2 = r sin 12 ds = (R + y − h) + (2y − h) [m2 ]
0 2 4
(8)
The solution of the equations of motion, equation 7, This mass moves over a total distance (double ampli-
results in: tude) of w3 ; this results in an inertia force of:

Mx = 12rg(w + w2 )2 w2 l c + (H + zG )mw (9) w2 w23 L

FYU−TANK = r c̈ [N] (11)
2
Experience has shown that the prediction of the
resonance frequency of the tank was not always
3.2. Resonance frequency of the U-tank
accurate. This inaccuracy is attributed to Stigter’s
choice for the length of the integration path for par- The resonance frequency of the tank follows directly
ameters E1 and E2 (Figure 7). Analysing results for from (7).; it is given by:
typical tanks, it appears that the result from the 
g
integration along the length of the duct up to half- v0 = [rad/s] (12)
way the bottom of the reservoir, length parameter w2 E1
(w + w1)/2, dominates the result for E1 and E2. It This can be simplified, for a small inclination angle of
was realized that integrating the horizontal part up the reservoir outside (α), to:
to halfway the width of the reservoir is not always 
a good choice. The integration path that extends 2gh
v0 = [rad/s] (13)
into the reservoir must be related to the height of w2 (w1 + w)
the duct in case of a wide reservoir. Results of
CFD calculations show that a good estimate for
the integration length is (w/2 + h) for h < w1/2; the
3.3. Effect of internal damping in the U-tank
effective length of the duct in the reservoir is the
same as the height of the duct. The effective length An internal arrangement in the U-tank usually con-
seems to be independent of having either a sharp or sists of brackets (often identified as baffles) built into
a rounded corner at the duct exit, this is illustrated the duct in a transverse direction with respect to the
by a flow visualization of a CFD result for these two flow. Also, the connection between the duct and the
cases, Figure 8. reservoirs is often built with a relatively sharp corner.
Stigter did not publish any estimate for the sway The flow restriction that these baffles and sharp corner
force produced by the tank, therefore a new model provide is represented by factor k in equation (7). This
was derived. The lateral force is determined by the factor is determined by a non-dimensional damping
 SHIP TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH 123

coefficient λ: the original publication. Even though baffles were

w2 w3
k=l ċ [m/s]
3ph2 E2
Or, in a non-linear time domain solver:
1 w2 w3
k=l |ċ| [m/s]
8 E2 h2
The factor k, and also the coefficient λ, are often
called damping or internal damping. The effect of
the internal damping on the roll moment produced
by the U-tank is illustrated in Figure 9. Increasing
the damping reduces the peak of the response curve,
it does not make the peak wider in absolute terms.
Relative to the peak value, however, the curve gets
wider for increasing damping.
3.4. Validation results U-tank
As a first validation case, the results for a U-tank as
published by Gunsing et al. (2014) have been selected.
This U-tank has vertical reservoir walls and a sharp
corner between the reservoir and the duct.
The first case used for the validation contained no
baffles in the duct, this was identified as Conf-1 in
not used, the sharp corner between the duct and reser-
(14) voir does introduce some flow restrictions, hence a
damping coefficient λ = 1.4 had to be applied. The
comparison in Figure 12 shows that the prediction
of the roll moment amplitude and phase angle is
(15) quite accurate and that the effect of the amplitude of
excitation is properly predicted.
The damping coefficient λ needs to be increased in
case baffles are introduced in the duct. Experiments
have been carried out with a bulkhead with nine
holes; this resulted in a restriction of the cross-section
of the duct of 59% of the area (Conf-3). Figure 11
shows that a calculation with a damping coefficient
λ = 8 corresponds closely to the experimental results.
Comparing these two results shows that the resonance
frequency is not changed, but the moment amplitude
is about half the value due to the additional baffles
Figure 10.
The second validation case is a different U-tank
design for which also the lateral force was measured.
The dimensions of this tank are listed in Table 1.
The corner of the duct to the reservoir was nicely
rounded, but the reservoir was mostly closed at the
top with only small vents. These vents created a

Figure 9. Roll moment produced by a U-tank with different internal arrangements resulting in different internal damping coeffi-
cient. Left: Roll moment for EGA = 1 deg. Right: Roll moment for EGA = 5 deg.

Figure 10. Validation of the model for the prediction of the moment and phase angle of a U-tank. Calculations using a damping
factor k = 1.4; comparison to the experimental results (Conf-1) by Gunsing et al. (2014).
124 G. KAPSENBERG AND N. CARETTE

Table 1. Main dimensions CRS U-tank. 4. Analytical model for the free surface tank
Parameter Abbr. Value units
Length tank (X-direction) L 6.53 m
4.1. Model for the roll moment of the FS-tank
Width tank (Y-direction) B 14.72 m
Height tank (Z-direction) H 3.68 m An analytical model for the moment of an oscillating
Length duct w 7.82 m FS tank was developed by Verhagen and Wijngaarden
Height duct h 0.989 m
Width reservoir bottom w1 3.45 m
(1965). They acknowledged that the physics of the
Width reservoir at water level w2 3.45 m fluid in the tank are fundamentally different for fre-
Water level y 1.84 m quencies around the resonance compared to frequen-
cies outside this range. At resonance, a shallow water
bore travels up and down the tank; this physical
significant amount of damping. These results were phenomenon does not occur at frequencies well
obtained by the CRS.1 Figure 12 away from resonance.
Using equation (15) in a non-linear time domain The main parameters used to describe the physics
solver for equation (7) gave also very good results in a FS-tank are illustrated in Figure 14. The resonance
using the same damping coefficient λ as in the linear frequency of the tank is determined by the velocity of
solution as presented above Figure 13. the shallow water bore (16). Using the first order

Figure 11. Validation of the model for the prediction of the moment and phase angle of a U-tank. Calculations using a damping
factor k = 8; comparison to the experimental results (Conf-3) by Gunsing et al. (2014).

Figure 12. Result of the model for the prediction of the lateral force (top) and moment (bottom), and corresponding phase angle,
of a U-tank. Calculations were carried out with a damping coefficient λ = 0.9. The experimental results were obtained by the CRS.
 SHIP TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH 125

Figure 13. Result of the model in time domain for the prediction of the roll moment (top) and lateral force (bottom) of a U-tank.
The experimental results were obtained by the CRS.


approximation c = gh0 for the velocity together with The associated phase angle is defined as:
the width B of the tank, the resonance frequency of the
FS tank can easily be determined (17): 1Mx = −12p + a for v , v0
(20)
1Mx = −12p −a for v . v0

gh1 (h1 + h2 )  With α defined by:
c= ≈ gh0 [m/s] (16)
2h2 ⎧ ⎫
⎨ p2 B (v − v )2 ⎬
0
a = 2 arcsin
p  ⎩ 24 g wa ⎭
v0 = gh0 [rad/s] (17)
B  
p2 B (v − v0 )2
− arcsin (21)
The theory used here to solve the shallow water 96 g wa − 3p2 B(v − v0 )2
bore is based on similarity with a moving piston in a The bore height is determined by:
gas cylinder that creates a pressure wave. This theory 
uses a perturbation parameter 1:  
h2 − h1 BV 2
= 4A1 1 − (22)
 h0 6Ac0
B wa
1= [−] (18)
p h0 Equation (22) uses parameters A and V that are
defined in equation (23). The resonance frequency
Although no strict limits were given in the publi- v0 is defined in equation (17).
cation, a practical limit of ε < 0.5 is recommended.  
 2 p2 h20
If 1 = (2/p)  0.8, the heel angle of the tank is A= 1+ 2
such that, in a static condition, the fluid is in a triangu- 3p B (23)
lar shape just covering the full width of the tank. In v − v0
V=
dynamic conditions this occurs at slightly lower values 1
of ε. Outside the region of resonance, the fluid motions can
Verhagen and van Wijngaarden derived the be described by classical shallow water theory based on
equation for the moment amplitude close to resonance the continuity (24) and the momentum equations
as: (25):
    ∂l ∂l ∂v
LB3 4 4 2h0 wa h0 v2 +v +l =0 (24)
Mx,a = rg 1+ ∂t ∂y ∂y
12 p 3B g
 2
p B(v − v0 )
2 (19) ∂v ∂v ∂l
× 1− + v + g + g w sin vt = 0 (25)
32g wa ∂t ∂y ∂y
[Nm] Linearizing the equations result in the following
126 G. KAPSENBERG AND N. CARETTE

lateral force is determined by:

 
w B v0 h0 v 2
Fy,a = −r g Lh0 a 1+
pv g
 
pv (28)
× tan
2 v0
[N]
Shallow water theory applied in a closed domain can-
not radiate waves so, there is no damping. Therefore,
Figure 14. Definition sketch of the parameters of a Free Sur- the phase angle in relation to the motion is zero.
face tank. The estimate of the lateral force in the resonance
regime is based on the concept used for the model
moment exerted on the ship: of the U-tank, it is based on the notion that a certain
  v 2  h v2 2v   pv   amount of mass moves from PS to SB. If we use a sim-
h20 0 0 0
Mx,a = rgLB3 w + 1+ tan −1 wa plified model of the fluid in the tank, Figure 16, the roll
2B2 a pv g pv 2v0
(26) moment can be estimated by:

This equation shows resonance peaks at frequencies mMOV g(B − s)

MX = [Nm] (29)
v/v0 = 1, 3, 5, … as illustrated in Figure 15. 2
The solution for the moment around resonance, If we assume that this mass oscillates with amplitude
equation (19), needs to be coupled to the moment (B − s)/2, we can relate the lateral force to the roll
resulting from the shallow water equations, (26); moment given by (28):
this can be done by a spline function as shown in
Figure 15. (B − s) 2 v2
FY = v mMOV = MX [N] (30)
2 g

4.2. Lateral force prediction for the FS-tank 4.3. Effect of internal damping in the FS-tank
The shallow water theory used to predict the moment Internal damping can be generated in different ways in
for frequencies outside resonance can also be used to a free surface tank. Experiments were carried out in
predict the lateral force. The wave elevation in the which partial bulkheads were placed in the tank per-
tank resulting from shallow water theory is pendicular to the velocity of the bore. These bulkheads
or ‘gates’ were fitted on both sides on a distance ± B/4
l = h0 from the centre line. Two sets of gates were used: the
 
wa Bv0 1 + (h0 v2 /g) pvy small gates reduced the effective cross-section by 25%
− sin (vt) sin (27)
pv cos (pv/2v0 ) Bv0 and the large ones by 50%. The results of the exper-
[m] iments show that (Figure 17):

If we consider the wave elevation at the outer ends of . The velocity of the bore, and hence the resonance
the tank, y = + B2 , and if we integrate the pressure, the frequency of the tank, is not affected to an

Figure 15. Left: Result of the shallow water equations for a wide frequency range showing multiple resonance peaks. Right: Com-
posite prediction of the moment produced by a FS tank; result of shallow water equations (red) and the model for resonance
frequencies (blue line), the spline function (black) connects the two parts.
 SHIP TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH 127

Figure 16. FS-tank with width ‘B’ and length of bore ‘s’. Figure 18. FS-tank at the time instant of maximum moment.

important degree. This is concluded from the fre- When the height of the bore is now reduced by a
quency for which the phase angle is −90 deg of factor h representing the effect of the gates, the
the three configurations, Figure 17. new height can be estimated by multiplying the
. The amplitude of the roll moment produced by the result of (31) by factor (1-η):
tank reduces significantly as a function of the size of 
 
the gates. This effect is modelled as a reduction of h∗2 − h∗1 BV 2
= (1 − h)4A1 1 − (33)
the height of the bore. h0 6Ac0
. Although not shown, a gate in the centreline of the
tank has the largest influence on the response, gates Since the magnitude of the lateral force was
have a decreasing effect as they are moved further coupled to the roll moment, (30), it is straightfor-
away from the centreline. These last can be helpful ward to adapt this estimate also for the effect of
in reducing the magnitude of the impact against the restrictions in the tank.
side walls Figure 18.

The previously presented analytical formulation for

the FS tank response does not include the effect of the 4.4. Validation results FS-tank
internal restrictions. These can be included assuming
that gates have mostly an effect on the height of the The FS-tank used for the validation is a rectangular
bore. When the moment generated by the tank is at container with dimensions listed in Table 2. Exper-
maximum, the bore is located exactly halfway in the iments have been carried out with different
tank. At that time instant, the moment can be amounts of water in the tank resulting in water
expressed as a function of the height of the bore and levels of h0 = 0.382, 1.337, 1.910 and 2.483 m. Two
a non-dimensional coefficient c1 : sets of gates have been used in the tanks, the first
reducing the cross-section by 25%, the second set
  by 50%. In each case, the obstructions were fitted
Mx,a 3 h2 − h1 h0
= c1 rg L B [Nm/rad] (31) at 25% of the width of the tank on both sides of
wa h0 8B
the centre line.
Comparing this result to equation (26), the value of
the non-dimensional coefficient c1 can be written Table 2. Main dimensions FS-tank used for the validation.
as: Parameter Abbr. Value units
Length tank (X-direction) L 3.818 m
 
Bwa h0 Width tank (Y-direction) B 18.4 m
c1 = 1.4306 [−] (32) Height tank (Z-direction) D 3.818 m
h0 h2 − h1 Water level (design value) h0 1.91 m

Figure 17. Roll moment and phase angle for a Free Surface tank. The figure compares experimental results for a smooth tank (No
gates) and two sizes restrictions (Small gates and Large gates reducing the cross-section by respectively 25 and 50%).
128 G. KAPSENBERG AND N. CARETTE

The limits of this tank were exceeded on several formulated as a sort of inside-out seakeeping problem;
occasions during the experiments, either when the the walls of the container are described by panels and
combination of a low water level and the excitation the fluid is inside. There is no incoming wave, and
angle EGA result in a partly dry tank (ε > 0.8), or at thus also no diffracted wave, only the wave created by
a high water level when the bore impacted partly moving the walls. Since the waves cannot leave the
against the top of the tank. These limits of the tank domain, no energy can be dissipated. The internal damp-
are further discussed in Ch. 8. ing is, therefore, zero, so the response at resonance is
Results of calculations and experiments for a low infinite. In order to model internal damping, the original
water level are shown in Figure 19. The larger excitation work proposed to use a damping coefficient on the body
amplitudes EGA of 5 and 10 deg result in values for the boundary condition:
perturbation parameter that are larger than the
∂w
specified range of applicability. The roll moment and = i1B kw + vn (34)
∂n
its phase angle are quite well predicted for the two
lower EGA values of 0.5 and 1.0 deg. The lateral force In which:
is however not very accurate for all amplitudes. w [m2/s] Potential of the flow
Figures 20 and 21 show results of calculations and n [m] Normal
ε [-] Damping factor
experiments for a water level of 1.91 m. These results κ [m-1] Wave number
are all in the range of validity of the ε parameter, the vn [m/s] Normal velocity of the surface
predicted and experimental results for the lateral
force and the roll moment, and their phase angles, This approach appeared not to give satisfactory results
agree now much better. These two figures also demon- in comparison to experimental data; therefore, an
strate the effect of adding rather large restrictions in alternative dissipation term 1FS was added to the
the tank. The resonance frequency does not change, boundary condition of the free surface:
but the peak moment amplitude is reduced, especially
∂w
for the lower excitation amplitudes. = (k + i1FS )w (35)
∂z
Parameter k is the wave number and 1FS is the dis-
5. Boundary element models for FS tanks sipation term that needs to be chosen. This method is
A practical Boundary Element Method (BEM) has been however not able to model the shallow water bore at
developed by Malenica et al. (2003). The problem is resonance in the tank; this phenomenon is not part

Figure 19. Lateral force (top) and roll moment (bottom) produced by the FS-tank with water level h0 = 0.382 m. 25% obstructions
in the tank. The predictions (full lines) are compared to results of bench tests (symbols). The perturbation parameter ε = 0.37, 0.52,
0.90, 1.64 for the cases EGA = 0.5, 1, 3, 10 deg respectively. No damping applied in the calculations.

of the solution of the linear BVP. The effect of the bore
is essential for the phase difference between motion
and produced moment, and hence for the effect of
the ART on the roll motion. The consequence is that
the method is more suited for tanks with a high
filling rate, such as might occur for an LNG tank,
than for an ART with a low filling rate.
This BEM method was also applied by Bunnik and
Veldman (2010), they compared results of calculations
to experimental results by Molin et al. (2008). They
considered a very large tank on a barge. The tank
had a high filling rate, so shallow water effects were
absent. Bunnik and Veldman showed that they could
reproduce experimental results well by tuning the
value of the dissipation term 1FS , Figure 22. However,
they also concluded that they could not accurately pre-
dict the 2nd resonance frequency of the barge – tank
combination; this 2nd resonance frequency is the
sloshing mode of the tank.
6. Computational fluid dynamics models
An anti-roll tank is an ideal object for modellisation in
CFD. The domain is limited, and the boundary con-
ditions are well defined. As a consequence, only a rela-
tively small computational effort is required, and very
good results can be obtained. Nevertheless, it is essential
to carry out a systematic grid study so that the results can
be analysed to determine the numerical accuracy of the
calculation using the method of Eça and Hoekstra
Figure 20. Lateral force (top) and roll moment (bottom) produced by the FS-tank with water level h0 = 1.91 m. The predictions
(full lines) are compared to results of bench tests (symbols). No obstructions in the tank. The perturbation parameter ε = 0.16, 0.23,
0.40, 0.73 for the cases EGA = 0.5, 1, 3, 10 deg respectively. No damping applied in the calculations.
SHIP TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH 129
(2014). An early study with a free surface tank was car-
ried out by van Daalen et al. (2000) using a Volume of
Fluid method (VoF). He showed that good predictions
could be obtained with a relatively coarse grid and with-
out solving the boundary layer. Also Bunnik and Veld-
man (2010) showed good results for this VoF method
coupled to a ship motion programme. They also used
the results of Molin et al. (2008) as a validation case
and showed much better results than those obtained
with the BEM that was mentioned before, Figure 23.
Solutions with a RANSE solver were presented by
Delaunay (2012), Thanyamanta and Molyneux (2012)
and Kerkvliet et al. (2014) for a U-tank. It appeared
to be important to closely monitor the conservation
of mass as the moment produced by the tank is directly
proportional to it. Mass losses often occur in initial
steps due to the mismatch of the grid with the free sur-
face. The U-tank considered was the one for which
experimental results were published by Field and Mar-
tin (1975). New experiments were done by Gunsing
et al. (2014); these researchers repeated the tests by
Field and Martin and then added various baffles in
the duct. Figure 24 shows results for the tank without
baffles. There are some differences in the various CFD
predictions; the results as presented by Kerkvliet et al.
(2014) compare quite well to the experimental results,
Figure 24. It is of paramount importance to accurately
model the geometry of the edges of the duct and the size
and type of vents in a U-tank as this drives the internal
damping, hence the response.
130 G. KAPSENBERG AND N. CARETTE

Figure 21. Lateral force (top) and roll moment (bottom) produced by the FS-tank with water level h0 = 1.91 m. The predictions
(full lines) are compared to results of bench tests (symbols). 50% obstructions in the tank. The perturbation parameter ε = 0.16,
0.23, 0.40, 0.73 for the cases EGA = 0.5, 1, 3, 10 deg respectively. Damping k = 0.40 applied in the calculations.

Results of CFD calculations compared to results of
experiments for a Free-Surface tank have been pre-
sented by Kerkvliet et al. (2016). The tank considered
has a complicated shape with inward sloping ends and
baffles. The results of the CFD calculations agree clo-
sely to the experimental results as shown in Figure 25.
Free surface tanks are more complicated to model in
CFD than U-tanks due to the travelling bore. The
bore has an almost vertical front that is difficult to cap-
ture by a compressive free surface scheme. The physics
of the bore impacts against the sides is also
complicated to model accurately due to air entrap-
ment, water jets and high velocities.
7. Experimental methods for ART
Bench tests are used to obtain a broad and accurate
determination of forces and moments produced by
an ART. They are typically used to investigate the
effect of geometrical variations, flow obstructions or
extreme motions.

Figure 22. Roll motion of a barge with a large FS-tank. The
plot shows results of calculations using a BEM for the motions
in the tank with different values of the damping coefficient,
Bunnik and Veldman (2010). These results are compared to
results of experiments by Molin et al. (2008).
Figure 23. Roll motion of a barge with a large FS-tank. The
plot shows results of calculations using the VoF method Com-
Flow (different grids) coupled to the ship motion programme
aNySIM, Bunnik and Veldman (2010). These results are com-
pared to results of experiments by Molin et al. (2008).

Figure 24. Experimental results for the U-type ART used by Field and Martin (1975) and Gunsing et al. (2014). Results of CFD
calculations of various authors are added.
Since the response of the tank is based on the EGA
parameter, roll oscillations around one axis of rotation
suffice; an example of an oscillating table is given in
Figure 26. To be able to transfer the response of the
ART to any location in the ship, it is important to
measure not only the moment response, but also the
lateral force. It is recommended to measure the
response of the tank directly underneath it with a
six-component force frame rather than measure the
torque in the axis of rotation. This approach also
ensures that the measured data only needs to be cor-
rected for the mass and inertia of the tank model,
this correction is linear and changes only the in-
phase part of the response.
The main advantage of experiments over a calcu-
lation method like CFD is that a broad range of con-
ditions can quickly be covered at a reasonable cost.
Most of the cost of experiments is in manufacturing
the model and in the test setup. The test procedure
can be automated to generate a large range of ampli-
tudes and frequencies of motions, as well as to analyse
the results. It is important to include sufficient waiting
time between different tests. It can take more than ten
oscillation periods for a tank with little internal
damping to have a calm water surface in the tank
after a test.
Each test should be preceded by careful calibration
of the setup. Dry oscillation tests are necessary to
Figure 25. CFD results for a FS-type ART with baffles; Prediction of the moment and phase angle by CFD calculations (red lines and
symbols) compared to experimental results from a moving platform (blue lines and symbols). Results from Kerkvliet et al. (2016).
SHIP TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH 131
accurately measure the mass, position of the centre
of gravity and the inertia matrix of the model for
later correction. The correction for the dry mass and
inertia is then easily performed using accurate motion
measurements during all other tests. This method is
preferred to a one-on-one subtraction between results
for an empty and a filled tank. The latter is much more
prone to errors and inaccuracies, in addition to the
cost of doubling the number of tests. The calibration
tests typically consist of a series of static inclination
tests to derive the mass and the position of the CoG,
and super-resonance oscillations to derive the inertia.
Those tests can also be used to derive the accuracy of
the six-component force frame using calibrated
weights. After this calibration procedure, but before
dynamic tests, it is useful to also perform inclination
tests with water. This allows verification of the water
mass and free surface effect, which should be perfectly
known beforehand. Such tests give an indication of the
accuracy of the model and filling height.
A test campaign should mostly contain regular
oscillation tests if the purpose is to derive the global
response of the tank. The motions should cover a
broad range of amplitudes and frequencies because
the response of the tank cannot be extrapolated.
Very small amplitude test are the most critical ones
due to high accuracy needed regarding motions, iner-
tia correction and forces in combination with very
132 G. KAPSENBERG AND N. CARETTE
Figure 26. The MARIN Forced Roll oscillation table ‘MARF’. A
U-tank is installed on the platform ready for testing. The
fluid in the tank has a red colour. The six-component force
frame (coloured yellow and blue) is mounted just below the
wooden installation plate.
little internal damping (requiring very long waiting
time between tests). However, such tests are very
important as the tank is most effective at small
amplitudes.
If the objective of the test campaign is to verify the
fidelity of a numerical model for an ART, regular
oscillations can be less practical. To cover a broad
range of amplitudes and frequencies, a lot of con-
ditions are needed. On top of this, a lot of oscillations
during each test could be needed to reach a constant
behaviour. This is not only time-consuming for the
experiments, but also for the calculations.
There is a type of motion that covers a large range of
non-linear effects in a short period of time. Such test
uses a frequency sweep motion, Figure 27. Typically,
three or four sweeps at various amplitudes are sufficient
to cover the full range of responses of the tank, and each
sweep is not much longer than one regular oscillation
test. The motion signal can directly be used in time
domain models to compare the numerical and exper-
imental response. Since the sweep is zero-bounded
and smoothly increasing and decreasing in amplitude,
the Fourier transform is perfectly defined, offering a
good transformation to the frequency domain if necess-
ary. Due to strong frequency interactions, the continu-
ous variation of the amplitude and due to transient
effects, the results cannot be used in comparison to
numerical frequency domain models. The method
does however allow a quick check of the response of
an ART in a wide range of conditions.
It is also possible to use a motion platform with
more degrees of freedom than a simple oscillation
table. Such a platform allows measurement of the
response of the tank due to arbitrary motions. The
approach is the same as for the oscillation table. The
tank should be placed directly on a 6-component
force balance attached rigidly to the motion platform.
This allows for a similar analysis as the oscillation
table using linear mass and inertia forces corrections.
Such a six-legged motion platform has been used to
investigate the effect of sway motion on the tank
response and to prove the EGA approach as discussed
in section 2.2. The results of this study, Carette (2015),
has shown that a simple oscillation table with
sufficient regular oscillation tests offers sufficient
information on the response of the tank to derive its
response under any arbitrary motion.
8. Limits of anti-roll tanks
8.1. Limits of U-tanks
The response of a U-tank is limited by:
. The water level dropping below the entrance to the
duct
. The water level hitting the top of the reservoirs
. Too small exhaust vents on the reservoirs.
All three parameters are dependent on the ampli-
tude of the water motions. Unfortunately, there was
no data available on the effect of exceeding the first
two limits. Small exhaust vents essentially add damp-
ing to the tank as demonstrated in the results from
experiments shown in Figure 28. The size of the open-
ing related to the area of the reservoir was 0.2, 0.8 and
3.0% respectively. The air velocity through these open-
ings can easily be determined using the calculated
water motions in the reservoirs. Results for the three
sizes of openings used in Figure 28 are listed in
Table 3. Note that a damping coefficient λ = 0.9
needed to be used for the analytical ART model to
match the results of the experiments with the large
vents. This means that even the 3% venting pipes
still add noticeable damping to the U-tank.
The result of an extreme test, Figure 29, showed
that a temporal water level of only half the height of
the duct does not result in much air in the duct. The
result of the analytical model still showed an accurate
prediction of the moment for this case, Figure 30. It
seems that there is some leeway in exceeding the
first mentioned limit.
8.2. Limits of FS-tanks
The limits for Free Surface tanks are:
. The water level in combination with the width of
the tank and the excitation angle is such that part
of the tank is dry during part of the oscillation.
. The bore impacts against the ceiling of the tank.
The parameter governing the first limitation is the

perturbation parameter 1 = Bwa /pho . Considering
a static situation, the water surface just touches the

Figure 27. Frequency sweep roll motion at 0.5 (blue line) and 5.0 deg (orange dotted line) maximum amplitude and correspond-
ing response moment.
upper corner of the tank wall and bottom when
√
1 = 2/p = 0.8. Results of bench tests with oscil-
lation amplitudes that exceed this limit are shown in
Figure 31. This figure clearly shows that not too
much can be expected from the theoretical model.
If the results of these experiments are compared to
those of the theoretical model, it appears that the error
in the predicted moment is not so bad; the main pro-
blem is in the phase angle. The phase angle at the natu-
ral frequency of 0.33 rad/s changes from −90 deg for
low values of ε, to −45 deg for the highest value of ε
during the experiments, and this is not captured by
the model. This means that the tank will no longer
perform as expected and will produce a lower amount
of damping than predicted Figure 32.
Figure 28. Effect of the size of the venting openings on the moment produced by an U-tank. The legend and Table 3 indicate the
size of the opening in the reservoirs.
SHIP TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH 133
If the water level is high relative to the height of
the tank, the bore can easily hit the top of the tank.
Figure 33 shows results of experiments with a FS-
tank with a 50% filling height (h0/D = 0.5). The
figure shows four different excitation angles, observ-
ing these shows that for EGA = 1.0 deg the bore just
hits the top of the tank resulting in a small jet. For
larger angles there is massive pile-up of water
against the top of the tank. Considering the theor-
etical height of the bore, Figure 34, it appears that
the maximum height of the bore when it impacts
the side of the tank is a factor 1.4 higher than
the theoretical maximum value when the bore is
half-way the tank. This means that, when we design
this tank to operate at a maximum EGA = 5 deg,
the tank needs to be a factor 2.7 times higher
134 G. KAPSENBERG AND N. CARETTE
Table 3. Area ratio (cross sectional area venting pipes / same
for the reservoir) of the venting pipes, amplitude of water
motions in the reservoirs (Zw-a) and air velocities (Vair)
through the venting pipes of a U-tank.
Large Medium
Area ratio [-] 0.030 0.008
Zw-a (wa = 3deg) [m] 1.50 0.65
Vair (wa = 3deg) [m/s] 36 54
than the fluid level to avoid the bore hitting the
top. The theoretical moment and phase angle are
compared to the experimental results in Figure 35.
This result shows that the consequences for these
parameters are not very large. The maximum
moment reduces a little, the peak shifts to a
lower frequency but the change in resonance fre-
quency is not very large.
The design value for the height of the tank depends
therefore on the design condition. A minimum height
appears to be a value of three times the design water
level at rest. This value was already mentioned by
van den Bosch and Vugts (1966b).
8.3. Safety aspects of anti-roll tanks
Both types of Anti-Roll tanks have limits above
which they do not work as intended. Essentially
this means that they will have hardly any effect
on extreme values. A ship designed with an ART
should therefore also be equipped with bilge keels.
These devices increase in efficiency (roll damping)
with increasing roll amplitude, opposite to ART’s.
ART’s and bilge keels are therefore the perfect com-
bination for a ship to provide roll damping at the
full range of amplitudes.
8.4. Design diagram for a FS tank
The natural period of a FS-tank is determined by the
water depth and the width of the tank, equation
(17). This relation can be shown in a design diagram,
Figure 36, that gives the water depth as a function of
the width of the tank for different resonance periods.
The same diagram also gives the maximum excitation
angle EGA. When this maximum value is exceeded,
part of the tank will be dry, thus reducing its
effectiveness.
This diagram shows that FS-tanks will not work for
a ship with a long natural period. The water level must
be low, so the maximum moment that can be gener-
ated will also be low. Due to the low water level to
width ratio, h0/B, the tank can only be used up to
small values of the EGA parameter which reduces
the operating envelope. The diagram shows that for
a tank of 30 m wide and a required resonance period
of 20 s, the water level needs to be h0 = 0.92 m. At
this water level, the upper corner of the tank dries
out for EGA angles larger than 3.5 deg, therefore the
operating range is very limited.
Small
9. Analysis of motions of a ship with an anti-
0.002
0.15 roll tank
36
9.1. Frequency domain solutions
The classical method of including the effect of an ART
in the equations of motion of a ship is to derive a
damping and a restoring coefficient B44 and C44,
from ART calculations or bench tests, and to add
these coefficients to the equation for the roll motion
of the ship. This means that data should be available
for the ART at the position of the rotation axis similar
to the height of the ART above the CoG of the ship. If
this is done, the effect of the local lateral acceleration
due to a roll arm is included, but not the effect the
local lateral acceleration due to other modes of
motion. Using just one set of B44 and C44 coefficients
means that the ART reaction forces are linearized
for the roll amplitude, this underestimates the ART
effect at low amplitudes and over-estimates the effect
at high amplitudes. The effect on the ship motions
of the lateral force produced by the tank is ignored
altogether in this approach.
The method presented here solves these problems
by:
. using the EGA as the driving parameter for the tank
. performing calculations for a range of amplitudes
(and frequencies) of the roll amplitude
. adding both the sway force and the roll moment
generated by the ART to the right-hand side
(RHS) of the equations of motion.
The response of the ART, its lateral force and roll
moment, is calculated by a separate programme.
This programme produces results in a database format
identified as a < >.fdb file in Figure 37.
The result of the ART programme is used in the
ship motion programme to solve the equations of
motion (EoM). To account for the non-linearity, the
EoM are solved for a series of fixed values of the roll
amplitude. The procedure is illustrated in Figure 37.
The input value of the linearization roll amplitude
fla is used to calculate an equivalent damping for
external non-linear roll damping devices like bilge
keels. The next step is an iterative procedure to solve
the EoM including the force and moment of the
ART interpolated for the current value of the EGA
parameter. In this case, the iterative procedure uses
the Newton method, hence the identification ‘Newton
scheme’ in Figure 37. The procedure is started with a
unit wave amplitude and zero ship motions. This
means that the force and moment from the ART are
zero for the first iteration step. This initialization is
 SHIP TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH 135

Figure 29. U-tank with rounded corners between duct and reservoir, large venting openings (3%), duct height 0.989 m. Oscillation
with EGA = 3 deg, v = 0.7 rad/s. The picture shows the moment of maximum fluid motion (water level indicated by a yellow
line); the fluid level is really close to the top of the reservoir on SB and is well below the top of the opening of the duct at PS.

required so that no roll motion is started for a sym-
metric ship in head seas. The Newton scheme takes
care of the proper combination of the six motions
including their phase angles to calculate the EGA at
the location of the ART and to have the proper
response from the ART. Since normally the result of
the EoM is a motion amplitude per unit wave ampli-
tude: xa i /za , the wave amplitude is used to determine
the dimensional values of the motions (in particular
the roll motion) so that the EGA in [deg] can be deter-
mined. This dimensional value is necessary to interp-
olate the proper values from the ART database.
For some conditions this procedure results in pro-
blems. The calculated roll motion of a symmetric ship
in head seas will be zero, so the necessary wave ampli-
tude to match the input roll amplitude will be infinite.
This consequence is however irrelevant: the final
answer is a zero roll RAO. The condition with a zero
or very small value of the roll RAO is checked in the
(fa /za ) . 11 box in the diagram of Figure 37; it is a
condition to stop the iteration procedure.
For cases in quartering wave directions, the pro-
cedure changes the wave amplitude until the value of
the roll RAO multiplied with this wave amplitude is
equal (within margin 12 ) to the required linearization
angle fla .
A comparison of the resulting roll motion using
this procedure to the traditional method based on
just using a roll moment damping and restoring
coefficient is shown in Figure 38. Using the EGA
parameter for the coupling results in lower roll
angles for low frequencies and higher roll angles

Figure 30. U-tank with rounded corners between duct and reservoir, large venting openings (5.9%), duct height 0.989
m. Comparisons of predicted and measured lateral force and roll moment.
136 G. KAPSENBERG AND N. CARETTE
Figure 31. Stills from a bench test with a Free Surface tank with a low filling rate and a relatively large motion amplitude. Filling
level h0/B = 0.02, 2 sets of small obstructions, oscillation frequency 0.40 rad/s (maximum moment). Top: amplitude wa = 3 deg,
Perturbation parameter ε = 0.90. Bottom: amplitude wa = 10 deg, ε = 1.64.
for higher frequencies. This is the effect of the lat-
eral acceleration in the EGA, its contribution
increases for higher frequencies.
9.2. Time domain solutions
Fully or weakly non-linear seakeeping codes are
designed to include non-linear external forces. These
codes are suitable to investigate the performance of
an ART. Using a time domain solver to model the
ship motions including the effect of the ART allows
to better investigate the change of roll and lateral
acceleration distributions, which is not possible with
frequency domain tools. This can be of importance
to further investigate the effect of the tank on the oper-
ability of the ship, and to verify criteria. Most criteria
use RMS values, this implies some linearity of the
response. An ART can strongly modify the response
spectrum and change the distribution of peak values.
Time domain solutions allow a first investigation of
such changes.
To the knowledge of these authors, there exists no
publication of analytical time-domain solution for an
ART including non-linear effects. Therefore, the
most common approach is to use a coupling with a
CFD model of the ART, as shown by Cercos-Pita
et al. (2015). As mentioned before, an ART is a good
candidate for CFD modelling due to its closed domain
with well-defined boundary conditions. Most non-lin-
ear seakeeping models use an explicit solver with lar-
ger time steps than the CFD ART model; this
facilitates the coupling. It is however a computation-
ally intensive solution as long simulations are necess-
ary to gather statistical data.
9.2.1. Impulse response functions
A much faster approach is to use the frequency
domain response of the tank to build so-called impulse
response functions. The damping operator of the tank
satisfies the zero-bounding and smoothness con-
ditions for such an approach. The impulse response
function has thus often a nice decaying shape as
shown in Figure 39.
The relation between the in- and out-of-phase part
of the tank response is less adapted for impulse
response functions than with normal wave damping.
In the case of the wave potential, the added mass has
the same offset at zero and infinite frequency. This
offset is thus corrected with a mean value. In case of
an ART, the in-phase part, the restoring term, does
not have the same offset. The restoring term at zero
frequency corresponds to the free surface effect, but
 SHIP TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH 137

Figure 32. Moment and phase angle of a FS-tank for excessive values of the perturbation parameter. Filling level of the tank h0/B
= 0.02, 2 sets of small obstructions.

Figure 33. Photos of the FS-tank bench tests. Filling height h0/D = 0.5, resonance frequency. The images show the moment the
bore fully hits the outer end of the tank. From top to bottom: EGA = 0.5, 1, 3 and 10 deg.
138 G. KAPSENBERG AND N. CARETTE
Figure 34. Non-dimensional maximum height of the bore as a
function of the excitation angle. Result according to the theory
presented, equation (33). Filling height of the tank h0/B = 0.11.
tends to zero at infinite frequency, assuming that the
frozen water component is included in the ship inertia.
This leads to an error from the convolution of the
impulse response function. Figure 40 presents the
restoring coefficient of an ART as expected and after
convolution of an impulse response function.
Therefore, using this method, either the free surface
effect or the resonance frequency of the tank can be
matched, but not at the same time. Depending on
the wave condition to be simulated, a match with
the one or the other should be carefully made.
Finally, response functions are linear. Normally
one function for each degree of freedom is used.
This is not acceptable since the response of the
tank is non-linear. An interpolation technique using
the roll envelope has been investigated with reason-
able results, Carette 2016. Using this semi non-linear
interpolated response function method leads to a cal-
culation time similar to a weakly non-linear seakeep-
ing code and results in realistic non-linear roll
distributions.
9.2.2. Analytical model for the U-tank
The analytical model as presented in chapter 0 can be
adapted for the time domain by combining equations
Figure 35. Experimental (symbols) and theoretical (lines) moment and phase angle of a FS-tank with a high filling rate, h0/D = 0.5.
The bore hits the top of the tank for EGA = 3 and 10 deg at the resonance frequency.
(7) and (15). This equation can be coupled to the EoM
of the ship to solve the coupled system in time domain.
9.3. Experiments in a wave basin
The oldest approach to investigate the performance of
an ART in a ship is by means of measurements. An
interesting example is the work of Watts (1883)
which is the first documented experiment with an
ART. Of course, full scale experiments are not fre-
quent due to the improvement of model scale exper-
iments. It is state of the art nowadays to include a
model of the ART in a model during seakeeping
tests. Due to the complex coupling between the ship
and the tank, and the non-linear effects on the roll
motions, it is actually strongly recommended to install
a model of the ART for seakeeping tests in oblique or
beam waves, even if the ART is not the direct purpose
of the experiments. The approach to install an ART
model can however be different for a FS or a U-tank.
For both types of ART, the tank model should not
protrude outside the ship hull, unless high above the
waterline. FS tanks are usually placed high in the
ship, so this requirement is almost always fulfilled.
U-tanks are often placed in the double bottom. In
that case, the outer side of the tank must be made of
thin materials with the exact hull geometry. The
tank model must then be seamlessly integrated into
the hull.
Similar to bench tests, the tank model should have
at least the front or back face made of a transparent
material. This can be very valuable to observe water
motions, for instance to document saturation. It can
also prove valuable to fill the model accurately. The
model should also be filled with water dyed with a
bright colour and well lit.
If possible, the tank model should be placed on a
six-component balance. Measuring the reaction forces
will offer much greater insight in the effect of the tank.
It is for instance not possible to estimate the natural
period of the tank from the roll motion of the ship.
Similar to bench tests, the balance should be placed

Figure 36. Design diagram for a FS-tank. Required water depth (blue lines) and maximum excitation angle EGA (red lines) as a
function of the width of the tank for three values of the resonance period T.
directly under the tank, and the tank model and
attachments should be made as light and stiff as poss-
ible to avoid excessive inertia force correction. If pre-
sent, ballast weights should never be placed on the
balance. Measuring the forces when the tank is
empty must be done accurately to be able to correct
the water forces measurements, this is not possible
when ballast is placed on the balance during some
tests.
The loading condition of the model must be cali-
brated carefully, and consistently. There are two
Figure 37. Procedure to include the non-linear response of
the ART in the equations of motion of a ship. This procedure
is repeated for a series of values of the roll amplitude – and
for all frequencies, speeds and headings.
SHIP TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH 139
main approaches. Either the water in the tank is com-
pensated for to maintain the natural roll period of the
ship independent of the water mass in the tank, or the
loading conditions with tank filled and empty must
match the real-life conditions. The first approach is
mostly applicable during design or validation tests. It
offers the advantage that resonant conditions remain
the same for the empty and the filled tests. The
other approach is relevant for final seakeeping tests.
For seakeeping tests, irregular seas are preferred as
being closer to real-life conditions. Including an ART
during such tests should not affect the test pro-
gramme: the tank must not be evaluated on its own,
the focus lies on the performance of the vessel. Such
tests are meant to assess that the ship meets the appli-
cable criteria, be it with or without the tank.
If the purpose of the test is also to investigate the
performance of the tank, it is important to choose
sufficient (encounter) wave periods. Tests should not
only be done in waves at the resonant frequency, but
in sea states that are relevant for the sailing region of
the vessel. Tests should then be repeated accurately
with the tank filled and empty.
The accuracy of model experiments can suffer from
scale effects. The response of FS-tanks is driven by the
dynamics of the bore. The speed of the bore is related
to shallow water wave theory, which scales according
to Froude’s law. Flow obstruction effects are believed
to be dominated by pressure drag and flow separation
at the gates. These effects do not suffer from noticeable
scale effects at the Reynolds numbers of interest. The
air flow in a FS-tank is not a driving factor in the
tank’s response.
Scale effects in U-tanks can be more complicated.
The driving factor for the tank response is the water
140 G. KAPSENBERG AND N. CARETTE

Figure 38. Roll motion and phase angle of a yacht equipped with a U-tank. The plot compares results from a calculation using a
coupling with just a damping and restoring coefficient (dashed lines identified as BC44) and using a coupling through the EGA
parameter (full lines). Results are given for three values of the linearization angle.

Figure 39. Impulse response function based on ART damping for various amplitudes.

motion in the reservoirs which is driven by gravity and
tank rotation and accelerations. These parameters fol-
low Froude scaling. The flow around obstructions in
the ducts is, similar to the flow around a flat plate,
dominated by flow separation. The flow at duct exits
and entries have a fairly constant discharge coefficients
over a broad range of Reynolds numbers, covering
model and full-scale flow regimes. The air flow in
and out of the reservoirs is important for the response
of the tank. The geometry of the venting openings
must correspond to full scale. The discharge
coefficient for the vents should scale without issues
as long as the Reynolds number is not changing too
much. The air flow through the vents should stay
well below the speed of sound.
We believe that scale effects are negligible as
long as the dimensions of the tank are not too
small. We build model tanks with a width of 1
metre at minimum. Our belief is supported by the
results of validation experiments in comparison to
analytical models and CFD calculations. These latter
have shown, Kerkvliet et al. 2014, 2016, that

Figure 40. Input and reconstructed restoring coefficient using impulse response functions.
 SHIP TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH 141

Table 4. Main dimensions of a motor yacht. calculated using the 3D panel programme Precal-R.
Parameter Abbr. Value units This programme has been developed by the CRS.
Length between perpendiculars Lpp 70.00 m The damping of the bilge keels is quadratic in relation
Beam B 10.94 m
Draft T 2.88 m to the local flow velocity due to the roll motion. From
Displacement Δ 1167 ton this non-linear damping an equivalent linear damping
Metacentric height GM 1.28 m
Roll gyradius kxx/B 0.35 –
has been determined to approximate the damping for
Roll resonance period Tw 7.5 s a series of roll amplitudes. The result is shown in as an
Bilge keel length LBGK 40.00 m amplitude dependent roll RAO, Figure 42. The roll
Bilge keel height HBGK 0.40 m
damping for small amplitudes is very low, resulting
in a very high peak of the roll motion; the roll angle
although vortices are slightly different at model and / wave slope parameter has a value of 19; an indication
full scale, this did not show noticeable effects on of a very low ratio of the roll damping / critical roll
the first order response of the tank. damping (0.4%). The right plot in Figure 42 is more
meaningful for a designer, it shows the roll amplitude
at resonance as a function of the wave amplitude. Sup-
10. Design procedure: ship with U-tank and
pose that the criterion for the roll amplitude is 5 deg, it
free surface tank
results in a very low operability in this condition
An ART design study has been carried out for a motor (beam seas, zero speed).
yacht. The hull form of the yacht is taken from the This design is ideally suited for an ART. A U-type
FDS series, Kapsenberg et al. (2015). The main hull ART is designed with a volume of 2% of the displace-
form parameters are listed in Table 4, a small-scale ment, so containing 23 m3 water. The size of the tank
body plan is given in Figure 41. The yacht has bilge is normally a parameter derived from the amount of
keels, but initially no other roll damping devices. damping required to meet the roll criterion as found
The motions at zero speed in beam waves have been in the design procedure; in this example the size is

Figure 41. Body plan of the motor yacht.

Figure 42. Roll motion of the motor yacht in beam seas, Vs = 0. Left: Roll RAO for different roll linearization amplitudes. Right:
Relation between roll angle at resonance and wave amplitude for the roll natural frequency.
142 G. KAPSENBERG AND N. CARETTE

Table 5. Main dimensions U-tank.

Parameter Abbr. Value units
Length tank (X-direction) LART 1.97 m
Width tank (Y-direction) BART 10.90 m
Height tank (Z-direction) DART 3.50 m
Length duct w 7.90 m
Height duct hD 0.68 m
Width reservoir bottom w1 1.50 m
Width reservoir at water level w2 1.50 m
Water level y 2.09 m
Max water motions in tank zw max 1.46 m
Volume tank Vol 23.00 m3

fixed. The tank is designed over the full beam of the

vessel; the choice has been made to have a width of
Figure 44. Roll motion of the motor yacht including the effect
1.5 m of the reservoirs. The duct height of the tank of the U-type ART in beam seas, Vs = 0. The figure shows the
is determined by the required natural frequency of roll RAO for different roll linearization angles.
0.84 rad/s. The height of the U-tank is 3.5 m. The
maximum vertical water motions in the reservoir to
avoid hitting the top of the tank or allowing air in Table 6. Main dimensions FS-tank.
the duct is: Parameter Abbr. Value units
Length tank (X-direction) LART 2.12 m
hUT − hD Width tank (Y-direction) BART 10.90 m
zW MAX = [m] (36) Height tank (Z-direction) DART 3.50 m
2 Water level h0 0.99 m
Max bore height zw max 1.48 m
Volume tank Vol 23.00 m3
The optimum water level in the tank is half-way the
height of the reservoirs above the duct:
The response of the yacht including the U-tank is
hUT + hD
y= [m] (37) shown in Figure 44. The response peak of the ART
2
appears to be narrower than the roll response of the
The required volume in the tank and the wetted roll motion of the yacht. This results in the two
cross-sectional area determine the length; the resulting ‘lobes’ on both sides of the resonance peak. The height
dimensions of the U-tank are summarized in Table 5. of these two lobes can be made equal by increasing the
The response of the tank has been calculated for a resonance frequency of the tank slightly. This change
range of values for the internal damping. The choice is achieved by increasing the height of the duct to
of which value to take, is determined by the water hD = 0.68 m. The peaks of the lobes look quite
motions in the tank and the requested maximum impressive at low values of the linearization angle. It
operating condition. If we assume that the tank should should however be realized that this concerns very
operate normally up to an effective gravity angle EGA low roll angles in very low waves. As the waves get
= 10 deg, the proper internal damping factor can be higher and the roll angles as well, the height of the
determined on basis of the diagram in Figure 43; the lobes reduce quickly. Lengthening or shortening the
proper choice appears to be k = 4. tank also modifies the distance between the lobes.

Figure 43. Amplitude of the water motions in the U-type ART Figure 45. Bore height in the FS-type ART (defined in Table 6)
(defined in Table 5) as a function of the oscillation frequency as a function of the oscillation frequency and the excitation
and the internal damping. Linearization angle EGA = 10 deg. angle EGA.
 SHIP TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH 143

volume, again similar to the U-tank. There are no

Figure 46. Roll motion of the motor yacht including the effect
of the FS-type ART in beam seas, Vs = 0. The figure shows the
roll RAO for different roll linearization angles.
The lobes will be closer to each other if the tank is
short. Note that the effect of the tank is linearly pro-
portional to its length, so the internal damping
might have to be adapted as well.
A second design for this yacht has been made using
a FS-tank, omitting considerations of noise for the
purpose of this exercise. The tank has been made
full-width, similar to the width of the U-tank. The
water level in the tank is determined by the roll natural
frequency as detailed in equation (17) and the length
of the tank has been determined by the required
internal obstructions in the tank, since free surface
tanks have by their physics already a lot of internal
damping. The resulting main dimensions have been
listed in Table 6. The height of the bore is shown in
Figure 45 for a few excitation angles up to EGA = 10
deg. The height of the tank seems to be high enough
to avoid the bore hitting the top of the tank; D/h0 =
3.5 Figure 46.
The performance of the FS-tank is superior to that
of the U-tank for this yacht. The moment produced by
the tank is compared for the two designs in Figure 47.
The moment produced by the FS-tank at the reson-
ance frequency is about 50% higher, while it is even
higher than that for sub- and super resonance fre-
quencies. The main reason for this is, that the amount
of moving mass in the FS tank is much larger than that
in the U-tank. If the height of the bore is 1.5 m, the
amount of water moving from PS to SB is about
hBORE · LART · BART /2 = 17.3 m3 . For the U-tank, the
amount of water is about:
2 · zW−MAX · LART · w1 = 8.6 m3 . The moment arm
in the U-tank is larger than the one in the FS-tank,
but this clearly does not compensate for the factor 2
in moving mass. Noted is, that a large part (46%) of
the water in the U-tank is in the duct, this water
does not contribute to the roll moment.

Figure 47. Moment and phase angle produced by the designed U-tank (full lines) versus the same produced by the FS-tank
(dashed lines). The moment is given for three values of the excitation angle EGA.

Figure 48. Performance of the yacht in irregular seas of different peak periods. The plot shows the significant double amplitude
roll angle (SDA) of the yacht without ART as dashed lines, the performance of the yacht with a U-tank as full lines (left), the per-
formance of the yacht with a FS-tank as full lines (right).
144 G. KAPSENBERG AND N. CARETTE
The roll motion of the yacht equipped with the FS-
tank is better than the one with the U-tank. This is
demonstrated by the RAO’s, Figure 46, and by the sig-
nificant double amplitude (SDA) value of the roll
motion in a sea state, Figure 48.
11. Conclusions
The classical models for respectively U-type and Free-
Surface type Anti-Roll tanks by respectively Stigter
(1966) and Verhagen and Wijngaarden (1965) have
been improved and extended. The improvement con-
cerns the calculation of the resonance frequency for
the U-tank and the extension concerns the calculation
of the lateral force produced by the ART.
An important step has been made in the coupling of
the ship motions to the ART and the effect of the force
and moment produced by the ART on the equations of
motion (EoM) of the ship. Rather than using just the
roll angle for the force/moment produced by the
ART, a combination of local lateral acceleration and
roll angle, the Effective Gravity Angle (EGA) is used
as the driving parameter. It has been shown that the
use of this parameter properly covers the effect of
the height of the rotation axis relative to the bottom
of the tank.
Information is given on the limit of the use of the
ART. For the U-tank, the limit is determined by the
height of the reservoirs and the water level in the reser-
voir relative to the opening of the duct. For the FS-
tank one limit is given by the combination of width
of the tank, water level and excitation angle. If this
limit is exceeded, part of the tank is dry, thus reducing
the effectiveness of the tank. A second limit is given by
the bore not only impacting the side of the tank, but
the tank top as well. Exceeding this limit has an
effect on the resonance frequency of the tank.
An example of a design exercise for a 70 m motor
yacht has been given. A U-tank and a FS-tank have
been designed, both tanks contain the same volume
of water. It appears that the FS-tank is more effective
for this case, the tank produces a moment that is
roughly 50% larger than the moment produced by
the U-tank. An important reason is the amount of
fluid that moves from side to side in the tank, this is
roughly a factor 2 more for the FS-Tank. An important
part of the fluid (46%) in the U-tank is in the duct; this
volume does not contribute to the roll damping. This
consideration, however, does not include other design
aspects such as noise, or active control of the U-tank.
Internal damping of an ART is an important par-
ameter in the design of a tank. It should be minimum
to ensure that the tank has the largest response poss-
ible. This allows the use of a smaller tank to effectively
reduce the roll motions. This is however at the cost of
tank height: high water motions require more head-
room. If this is not available, a longer tank will be
necessary to achieve the same performance. This has
as side effect that the ‘side lobes’ in the roll response
will be brought further apart. This effect may be ben-
eficial for operability, however at the cost of a heavier
tank.
Vent size for U-tank should not be underestimated.
These can produce a significant internal damping.
Very small vents may completely annihilate the tank
response as air velocity may become excessively
high. This may also introduce noise issues.
Notes
1. The Cooperative Research Ships (CRS) is an inter-
national organization that develops knowledge for
ships. Website: www.crships.org.
2. More information: www.crships.org.
Acknowledgement
The main part of this work has been performed in the Coop-
erative Research Ships (CRS) organization in the Roll
Reduction (I and II) working groups. The CRS is a group
of 26 companies carrying out hydrodynamic research.2 Per-
mission to publish these results is gratefully acknowledged.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the
author(s).
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