"EDT Jane" goes to sea

On last October 11th the ship "Jane EDT", designed for support of marine platforms, left La Naval's (Sestao, Spain) fitting-out quay, and run down the river for sea trials before delivery to her owner, the Cypriot group EDT.

 In my blog post on 26/07/2013 I reported the launch of sister ship "EDT Hercules", whose delivery is foreseen in next spring and showed their main features that I will not repeat here, just to remember that both sister ships came from a renegotiation of their contract with CNN Group (Construcciones Navales del Norte) from that the owner got with the former Astilleros de Sevilla, that suspended its activity.

These vessels for EDT are the last two in the current portfolio of La Naval, which, according to my information, is awaiting confirmation for one or several new contracts currently under negotiation. I hope and wish that this will happen soon and I can continue reporting on the activities of this historic shipyard whom I'm bound to from unforgettable experiences and professionals memories after sharing so many years working in their facilities.

Following video shows the historic moment of this vessel passing under the "hanging Vizcaya bridge" and I emphasize historic because it was the first time a ship fitted with the famous "X bow" sailed under this bridge (I do not consider the trip in reverse direction she made a few months ago, way to her fitting-out in La Naval, because she wasn´t still a genuine and complete vessel).

Preliminary dimensioning

Cargo ships

In my post of April 9, 2010, I presented a form to get a preliminary dimensioning of cargo ships once the user defined her type and a goal particular, deadweight, cargo volume or containers number, depending on the selected type. I have revised the form to be used and I present now its second edition.

To use this procedure click on following 

                                                   "CALCULATE"

WindFlip: A barge to transport and position wind turbines

Innovative System from WindFlip AS

 Electric generation by wind turbines is increasing dramatically in Europe and other areas and placement of turbines at sea (offshore) is one of the booming posibilities due to the increased performance and environmental advantages that are got. However transport operations and placement of wind turbines at sea pose a significant cost and require the use of special vessels dedicated to these tasks.

 Recently, new ideas are being released to solve or ease these problems and one of the most recent is the use of special barges, towed, low cost, as the type called WindFlip.

 WindFlip is a simple barge which loads the complete wind turbine, is towed to its site at sea and there is ballasted and flipped by stern up to the vertical and then the turbine pedestal end is buried in its working position. WindFlip is unballasted then by injecting pressurized air in the tanks and proceeds returning to port. So simply said it seems easy, but I suppose it will be quite complicated, nevertheless it seems a bright idea and hopefully satisfactory.

This video briefly shows an outline of the operation, where nothing can be seen how to move the turbine from its location on shore up to its place on WindFlip, but I do not think it will be a big problem.

A typical WindFlip is about 100 m long and 30 m wide and such a barge could carry a complete wind turbine of 65 m and 15 MW  power.

WindFlip uses an old idea, the pivotting ship type named FLIP (Floating Instrument Platform), to solve a new problem. The FLIP is as old as 1962 and was used by the United States navy as an ocean research platform, providing to the involved scientists  a still and comfortable workstation, compared to that offered by a ship floating and moving among the waves. The Ship-Technology.com site describes and shows the ideas and reality of this ship.

Should cruise ships have a double hull ?

Considerations on the Costa Concordia accident

The recent accident involving the cruise ship Costa Concordia on the Italian coast of the Giglio Island is producing the usual questions that arise after any disaster affecting human lives. It is the question of whether the safety of the facility in question is sufficient, be it either a ship, aircraft, train, skyscraper etc. Clearly there is not a complete safety in any order of life, but it is also clear that any current safety level can be improved and the issue is deciding when and where the laws and regulations governing safety are to be changed to get better expectations.

History teaches us that mankind is learning the hard way. When we suffer a great accident is when we consider that perhaps safety provisions are not adequate and should be analyzed in detail and realism to decide whether they should be improved.

Ship lightweight Calculation

(In cargo ships preliminary design)

Introduction

The calculation of the ship lightweight and her center of gravity is one of the basic tasks to be performed in the ship initial design stage, where it is advisable to be able to perform quick, approximate calculations, allowing to quickly analyze many alternative dimensionings. In this blog I present a form to enter the main dimensions of a cargo ship from which the program computes, approximately, the ship lightweight and center of gravity height broken down in Steel, Equipment and Machinery. Results are limited to ships up to 320 m. length between perpendiculars and aspect ratios should be normal.

Ballast-free ships

In the realm of ships, ballast is a fixed or transitory weight that must be placed on board to solve or alleviate what I name " ballast-related problems" (BRPs), what means those problems that can fixed by using ballast. For example, BRPs are a poor ship's stability, insufficient or inadequate drafts, propeller(s) incomplete immersion, excessive ship movements at sea, etc.

Classification Societies

 Public presentation of the José Antonio Reyero's book

 The Maritime Administration School of the Transport Department from the Basque Government held on 25 January an event entitled "The Classification Societies", whose central theme was the presentation of the book with the same name by author José Antonio Reyero, with a second part by Juan José Alonso Berástegui, which related a few brief memories of his experiences as a naval architect and as a director in Bilbao shipyards, where he met professionally with such a kind of organizations, and finally the meeting was closed by Luis Cañada Vicinay, President of the Basque Maritime Forum. The event was held at the auditorium of the Bilbao Maritime Museum.

Presentation: José Luis Trueba

The event began with an opening by the School of Maritime Administration Director, José Luis Trueba, followed by a welcome greeting by Bernabé Unda, Director of the Industry, Innovation, Trade and Tourism  Department in the Basque Government, and then the speakers proceed to present their respective contributions.

A visit to ferry "Volcán del Teide" in Astilleros de Santander (Santander Shipyards)

On 28 December a group of friends were invited by Jaime Oliver to visit in Santander Shipyards, the ferry ship "Volcan del Teide", which at those days was being painted and finishing works before her delivery to her owner "Naviera Armas", so ending the construction of the vessel built  in Vigo's (Spain) H.J. Barreras.

 

A model of sailing vessel "Tuiga"

In my post from January 14 this year I presented several ship models built by Juan Ignacio Argaluza, who is an expert ship models craftman, what can be appreciated by looking at the pictures of his creations, although it´s not the same as seeing the actual models , in order to appreciate the extraordinary detail and accuracy of its components.

Lloyd's Register's 250th anniversary

Lloyd's Register is a ships classification society widely known in all marine shipping areas, which this year is celebrating its 250th anniversary, so I join the chorus of congratulations from the whole maritime family with my wishes they continue working for many years in their usual fields, and in those that technological progress will gradually be opening.

 

 

Estimating Ship's Gross Tonnage

On a past post I explained a simplified method to do an aproximate estimation of a ship's gross tonnage and an exact calculation of the compensated gross tonnage. Herein I enclose a simple input form to enter ship's main dimensions that produce results as explained in the mentioned past post.

Gross Tonnage GT, Compensated Gross Tonnage CGT

 

If you know the actual gross tonnage just input its value in the text box (cyan color), and click button "Calculate". If you don't know the actual gross tonnage, input ship's dimensions and click "Calculate"

Ship type  Bulk carrierOil tankerChemical tankerProduct tanker General cargo Coaster ReeferLPG carrier Container carrier

Gross Tonnage GT:
Length PP (m):
Breadth (m):
Depth (m):
Block coefficient:

Result GT

Result CGT

Ship models from Juan Ignacio Argaluza

In my post of 10 April 2008 in this blog I wrote a note about the historic racing yacht Hispania, recently rebuilt at Astilleros de Mallorca, recovering an authentic jewel of sport shipbuilding, of true both technical and historical interest.

A few days ago I was phoned by  Juan Ignacio Argaluza, Getxo's neighbor like me, whom I did not meet before, informing me that he was building a model of the sail yacht Tuiga, twin of Hispania, and having read my blog note he had got an interest in commenting to me on some respects . A few days later I visited him at his home and he showed me the model of the Tuiga's hull , under construction, and told me he was finding some problems due to lack of ship's drawings that will guide his work.

Tuiga hull's model (click to zoom)

 Hispania at Astilleros de Mallorca

La Naval shipyard, of the Spanish shipbuilding group CNN builds a fall pipe type ship 

Last February La Naval shipyard, from Sestao, near Bilbao, launched the ship "Simon Stevin", of fall pipe type, having a double mission, rock dumping in water depths up to 1.700 m, and, at the other hand, deep water mineral mining. Rock dumping is devoted to marine works such as protection of submarine cables and pipes, sea bottom refilling in underwater works, etc.



This type of ship is a new one in Spanish shipbuilding and only a few of them are in operation worldwide.