In the present study, as a novel and alternative form of foundation for offshore wind turbines, the air-floating characteristics of a large-diameter multi-bucket foundation (LDMBF) in still water and regular waves are investigated. Following the theory of single degree of freedom (DOF)-damped vibration, the equations of oscillating motion for LDMBF are established. The spring or restoring coefficients in heaving, rolling and pitching motion are modified by a dimensionless parameter ϑ related to air compressibility in every bucket with the ideal air state equation. Combined with the 1/25 scale physical model tests and the numerically simulated prototype models by MOSES, the natural periods, added mass coefficients and damping characteristics of the LDMBF in free oscillations and the response amplitude operator (RAO) have been investigated. The results shown that the added mass coefficients between 1.2 and 1.6 is equal to or larger than the recommended values for ship dynamics. The coefficient 1.2 can be taken as the lower limit 1.2 for a large draft and 1.6 can be taken as the upper limit 1.6 for a small draft. The resonant period and maximum amplitudes for heaving and pitching motions decrease with increasing draft. The amplitudes of heaving and pitching movements decrease to a limited extent with decreasing water depth.

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Currently, water jets are mainly used in the fields of mechanical processing and mining collection. This paper creatively introduces them to the field of safety assurance for inland navigation. Compared with the traditional bridge anti-striking methods such as intelligent early warning and passive anti-striking, this method can form an “interference zone” by changing the water flow conditions in the local bridge water areas, causing the yawing moment of the yaw ship to change, thereby causing the ship’s course to change, and thus guiding the ship to move away from the bridge pier to realize active anti-striking of the ship. In this paper, a combination of generalized model testing and numerical simulation was used to study the effects of different nozzle pressures and different ship pier distances of the water-jet generator on the trajectory and drift angle of the stalled ship. The results showed that the numerical simulation was in good agreement with the model test results. Within the interference zone, the distance between the ship and the pier increased rapidly after the action of the disturbance zone to 9.1, 5.8, and 6.2 times the ship’s width, respectively, reaching a safe distance. During the process of being affected by the interference zone, the maximum drift angle of the yaw ship was less than 20°, the course of the ship was generally stable, and the drift angle comparison error was a maximum of 10.6%, a minimum of 3.5%, and an average error of 6.7%. A negative peak and a positive peak of four times the absolute value of the negative peak occurred in the yaw-moment ephemeral curve during the ship’s passage through the interference area. The method had a notable effect on the anti-striking of stalled ships and two invention patents applied for in the course of research.

Large-diameter multi-bucket foundation is well suited for offshore wind turbines at deeper water than 20 m. Air floating transportation is one of the key technologies for the cost-effective development of bucket foundation. To predict the dynamic behavior of large-diameter tripod bucket foundation (LDTBF) supported by an air cushion and a water plug inside every bucket in waves, three 1/25-scale physical model tests with different bucket spacing were conducted in waves; detailed prototype foundation models were established using a hydrodynamic software MOSES with a draft of 4.0 m, 4.5 m, and 5.0 m and with a water depth of 10.0 m, 11.25 m, and 12.5 m. The numerical and experimental results are consistent for heaving motion, while exhibiting favorable agreement for pitching motion. The results show that the resonant periods for heaving motion increased with increasing draft and water depth. The maximum amplitude for heaving motion first decreased and then increased with the increase of water depth and spacing between the buckets. The maximum amplitude for pitching motion first decreased and then increased with increasing water depth but decreased with increasing spacing between the buckets. The wider the spacing between the bucket foundations, the larger the heave response amplitude operators (RAOs). Simply improving the pitch RAOs by increasing the spacing between bucket foundations is limited and negatively affects motion performance during the transportation of LDTBF.