Numerical study on the physical mechanisms of non-bottom mounted baffles to suppress liquid tank sloshing

A non-bottom mounted baffle is proposed in this paper to overcome the deficiencies of the traditional fixed baffles that can only effectively suppress the sloshing at a specified filling level, not always ensuring that the violent liquid sloshing triggered by the external excitation is prevented from causing damage to the tank structure. Based on a series of numerical experiments, one locally optimal baffle configuration is derived which can largely suppress the liquid sloshing by the synergistic effect of the web plate and bottom flange. Specifically speaking, the free surface is successfully separated into two parts by the web flange, effectively reducing the size of the region where the liquid can move freely in the upper part of the tank. The movement of the bottom flange can efficiently suppress the liquid sloshing by triggering vortex shedding to dissipate the kinetic energy of the fluid and by appropriately disturbing the flow state beneath the free surface to counteract the movement of liquid induced by external excitations. Thus, the maximum anti-sloshing effect can be maintained in most cases even though the filling level is changed, consequently exceeding the performance of various fixed baffles.