Efficient computation of steady solitary gravity waves

An efficient numerical method to compute solitary wave solutions to the free surface Euler equations is reported. It is based on the conformal mapping technique combined with an efficient Fourier pseudo-spectral method. The resulting nonlinear equation is solved via the Petviashvili iterative scheme. The computational results are compared to some existing approaches, such as Tanaka's method and Fenton's high-order asymptotic expansion. Several important integral quantities are computed for a large range of amplitudes. The integral representation of the velocity and acceleration fields in the bulk of the fluid is also provided. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.