Objective The purpose of this paper is to study the hydrodynamic and cavitation flow characteristics of the self-designed cavitation propeller model PC 456 in oblique flow.

Methods The numerical solution was solved using the ISIS-CFD solver integrated in the commercial software Fine/Marine, combined with turbulence models and Schnerr−Sauer cavitation models, and used sliding surface mesh technology for numerical simulation. First, the open water performance simulation results of the standard blade model DTMB 4119 under non cavitation uniform flow conditions were compared with experimental data, and the independence of four sets of grids was studied to verify the accuracy of the numerical model established in this paper. Then, the open water performance of the PC 456 propeller was predicted, and the Schnerr−Sauer cavitation model was applied to simulate its uniform inflow and cavitation under different oblique flow conditions.

Results The results indicate that oblique flow can interfere with the hydrodynamic performance of propeller model PC 456. On the one hand, it is manifested in the fluctuation of single blade thrust coefficient and torque coefficient caused by oblique flow at different positions; On the other hand, it is manifested in the influence of oblique flow on propeller cavitation, which in turn causes varying degrees of disturbance to performance.

Conclusions The larger the inclination angle of the propeller, the greater the fluctuation of the thrust coefficient and torque coefficient of the blade at different positions; However, propeller cavitation causes varying degrees of disturbance in both thrust and torque coefficients at two different inclinations, and the degree of disturbance is not directly proportional to the cavitation area.