Recently, there is a tendency to design the large full ships with lower-powered engine as the means for energy saving in ship's navigation at seas. Such a lower-powered ship is anticipated to show the different propulsive performance in rough seas, because the fluctuation of main engine load of lower powered ship is relatively large as compared with higher-powered ship is relatively large as compared with higher-powered ship. The fluctuation of propeller load is nonlinear at racing condition in waves. It is due to the variation of inflow velocity into propeller, the propeller immersion and the characteristics of engine governor. In this paper, the theoretical calculation of the nominal speed loss and the numerical simulation for the nonlinear load fluctuation of a model ship in rough seas are carried out. From the results of calculation, the following are discussed. (1) The ratio of nominal speed loss to the speed in still water. (2) The manoeuvring ability of ship and the operational ability of main engine in a seaway. (3) A method of the evaluation for the fluctuation of propeller torque and revolution on the engine characteristics plane. (4) The effect of engine governor characteristics on the propeller load fluctuation.

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