Panel method

A panel method discretizes a body surface, and for ships the local free surface, into flat or curved panels carrying potential-flow singularities such as sources, doublets, or Rankine sources, whose unknown strengths are found by enforcing the no-penetration boundary condition at panel control points. It solves Laplace’s equation for an inviscid, irrotational, incompressible flow, producing a dense linear system. Hess and Smith introduced the surface-source method in 1964. It predicts pressure distribution, wave-making resistance, added mass, and wave-exciting forces, but excludes viscosity, so skin friction and separation need a separate boundary-layer or RANS model.