In this paper, the partially cavitating flow over an axisymmetric projectile is studied in order to obtain the optimum cavitator such that, at a given cavitation number, the total drag coefficient of the projectile is minimum. For this purpose, the boundary element method and numerical simulations are used. A large number of cavitator profiles are produced using a parabolic expression with three geometric parameters. The potential flow around these cavitators is then solved using the boundary element method. In order to examine the optimization results, several cavitators with a total drag coefficient close to that of the optimum cavitators are also numerically simulated. Eventually, the optimum cavitator is selected using both the boundary element method and numerical simulations. The effects of the body radius and the length of the conical section of the projectile on the shape of the optimized cavitator are also investigated. The results show that for all cavitation numbers, the cavitator that creates a cavity covering the entire conical section of the projectile with a minimum total drag coefficient is optimal. It can be seen that increasing the cavitation number causes the optimum cavitator to approach the disk cavitator. The results also show that at a fixed cavitation number, the increase in both the radius and length of the conical section causes the cavitator shape to approach that of the disk cavitator.

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