Structural Topology Design of Container Ship Based on Knowledge-Based Engineering and Level Set Method

Knowledge-Based Engineering (KBE) is introduced into the ship structural design in this paper. From the implementation of KBE, the design solutions for both Rules Design Method (RDM) and Interpolation Design Method (IDM) are generated. The corresponding Finite Element (FE) models are generated. Topological design of the longitudinal structures is studied where the Gaussian Process (GP) is employed to build the surrogate model for FE analysis. Multi-objective optimization methods inspired by Pareto Front are used to reduce the design tank weight and outer surface area simultaneously. Additionally, an enhanced Level Set Method (LSM) which employs implicit algorithm is applied to the topological design of typical bracket plate which is used extensively in ship structures. Two different sets of boundary conditions are considered. The proposed methods show satisfactory efficiency and accuracy.     

Fuzzy inference system for the risk assessment of liquefied natural gas carriers during loading/offloading at terminals

A multiple attribute risk assessment approach using a fuzzy inference system is developed in this work. The approach is based on the use of fuzzy sets, a rule base and a fuzzy inference engine. Traditional input probabilities and consequences used in risk assessment are represented by fuzzy sets to take into account uncertainties associated with the assignment of their values. The output risk values can be presented as crisp values or fuzzy sets with associated degree of membership. The fuzzy inference system FIS is used as an alternative approach to qualitative risk matrix techniques currently used in many industries and by ship classification societies. Two approaches for fuzzy inference are adopted. These include the Mamdani approach in which output risk values are fuzzy sets and the Sugeno method of fuzzy inference, in which output risk values are constant or linear.The use of a fuzzy set approach is particularly suited for handling multiple attribute risk problems with imprecise data. It improves upon existing qualitative methods and allows the ranking of risk alternatives based on a unified fuzzy risk index measure. Results show that while the Mamdani method is intuitive and well suited to human input, the Sugeno method is computationally more efficient and guarantees continuity of the final risk output surface. Results also show that computed risk values using a fuzzy risk index measure are consistent with those obtained using a qualitative risk matrix approach. The proposed methodology is also applicable to other ship operating modes such as transit in open sea and/or entering/leaving port. A case study for a liquefied natural gas LNG ship loading/offloading at the terminal is presented to demonstrate the developed approach capability.     

Development of internet-based ship technical information management system

In this paper, internet-based ship technical information management system has been developed as a means to accumulate, manage, share and utilize various distributed applications and information used for ship design and building. The information managed in the system is documents from the whole life cycle including concept design, basic design, detailed design, construction, operation and maintenance. In addition, using the developed system, integrated system framework is also proposed to integrate applications and database in concurrent engineering environment.     

Simultaneous optimization of propeller–hull systems to minimize lifetime fuel consumption

In traditional naval architecture design methodologies optimization of the hull and propeller are done in two separate phases. This sequential approach can lead to designs that have sub-optimal fuel consumption and, thus, higher operational costs. This work presents a method to optimize the propeller–hull system simultaneously in order to design a vessel to have minimal fuel consumption. The optimization uses a probabilistic mission profile, propeller–hull interaction, and engine information to determine the coupled system with minimum fuel cost over its operational life. The design approach is tested on a KCS SIMMAN container ship using B-series propeller data and is shown to reduce fuel consumption compared to an optimized traditional design approach.     

Recognition of design symbols from midship drawings

Despite the availability of 3D CAD systems, the designers in shipyards still use 2D CAD systems because of the need to produce drawings rapidly and a shortage of labor. The shipyard spends much time and labor analyzing the design information contained in 2D drawings and creating 3D model for the downstream processes. The design information is represented by symbols that are well known among designers in shipyard. Symbols are expressed by meaningless geometric shapes. These shapes are recognized to have meanings by analysis of experienced and knowledgeable designers.We propose a method for automatic recognition of 2D symbols and the extraction of design information from the midship drawings. The shape and rationale of 2D symbols used in ship design have been analyzed, and symbols have been classified according to the analysis. Based on the classified symbols, the developed system recognizes the symbols expressed in 2D drawings. The extracted design information is assorted by design rationales. The meaningless geometric shape is translated into the design information including designer's intents. The extracted design data can be applied to the design process in shipyards, and the 3D ship model can be automatically created.     

Contact dynamics of two floating cable-connected bodies

We consider two ship-like bodies connected by six cables and excited by waves. The cables might be under tension, or they might be slack, thus forming a unilateral system generating possible impacts. The impact forces can reach 20,000 kN and are able to cause damage to a ship. In order to avoid such large impact forces, anti-shock buffers might be adopted but good buffer design requires knowledge of the impact forces. We have evaluated these using multi-body theory with unilateral contacts in combination with classical ship dynamics, which allows modeling of the contact dynamics of two floating bodies in an ocean. Based on an optimization algorithm a method using an artificial neural network (NNW) has been developed to determine the combination of possible constraints at each step. The results of a numerical example compare reasonably well with experiments. We have thus established a theoretical basis for further buffer design.     

An Experimental Investigation on the Dynamic Response of a Damaged Ship with a realistic arrangement of the flooded compartment

The dynamics of a damaged ship in waves is a complex phenomenon regarding fluid and structure interactions. Flooded water motions in the damaged compartment could be influenced by decks, obstructions and obstacles in the compartment. This becomes particularly relevant in case of flooding in the engine room that is usually characterized by the presence of large objects such as engines and machineries. In such cases the possibility to better understand the behavior of a damaged ship, influenced by the fluid and structure interactions, could provide novel outcomes and thus enhance the damaged ship safety.In this paper an experimental campaign is conducted on a passenger ferry hull. The effects of obstacles in the engine room compartment, such as decks and engines, on ship roll responses, are studied. Roll decay in still water and steady roll responses in beam regular waves at zero speed are measured for the empty compartment and for the compartment with obstructions, as defined above.The main outcomes from the conducted experiments disclose a mitigation of the resonant behavior of the coupled system, ship with damaged compartment, by having engine shapes occupying the flooded engine room. Moreover it is possible to observe how the resonant frequency of the ship modifies having a more realistic arrangement of damaged compartment and how motion RAOs and roll decay characteristics modify accordingly.     

A neural network approach to ship track-keeping control

This paper presents an on-line trained neural net work controller for ship track-keeping problems. Following a brief review of the ship track-keeping control development since the 1980's, an analysis of various existing backpropagation-based neural controllers is provided. We then propose a single-input multioutput (SIMO) neural control strategy for situations where the exact mathematical dynamics of the ship are not available. The aim of this study is to build an autonomous neural controller which uses rudder to regulate both the tracking error and heading error. During the whole control process, the proposed SIMO neural controller adapts itself on-line from a direct evaluation of the control accuracy, and hence the need for a “teacher” or an off-line training process can be removed. With a relatively modest amount of quantitative knowledge of the ship behavior, the design philosophy enables real time control of a nonlinear ship model under random wind disturbances and measurement noise. Three different track-keeping tasks have been simulated to demonstrate the effectiveness of the training method and the robust performance of the proposed neural control strategy     

The influence of some ship parameters on manoeuvrability studied at the design stage

Collision and grounding are the most common accidents in ship operation. Some accidents are due to human failure, but several research projects have shown that a high percentage of these accidents could have been avoided if the ship have had better manoeuvrability characteristics. This paper describes how, when the shipyard select some important ship parameters and dimensions at the design stage, these set of parameters influence manoeuvrability characteristics. To obtain these effects, some IMO manoeuvres have been numerically simulated for a sample ship and a non-linear numerical model proposed by the authors to study ship manoeuvrability is described in this work. The day to day practice of a shipyard where fast modelisation and calculations are required, and modifications to the original design are quite common at the preliminary design stage, requires fast but accurate numerical models.     

Development of the collision ratio to infer the time at which to begin a collision avoidance of a ship

A prior study attempted to solve the intrinsic problem of a critical collision condition including the slower ship’s dilemma by considering the maneuverability of the own ship and the International Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea (COLREGs). The collision ratio proposed in the previous study provided insight into the solution of the intrinsic problem, but it was not suitable as an index to determine the time at which to begin the maneuver to avoid the collision.This paper develops a collision ratio as an index that can be used to determine the time at which to begin the collision avoidance maneuver. The collision ratio is calculated by considering the maneuverability of the own ship, the COLREGs, and three virtual intrusion domains (VIDs). The validity of the inferred collision ratio is then assessed according to the dynamic characteristics of the own ship and the basic knowledge of the collision avoidance algorithm. The results indicate that the proposed collision ratio is suitable for use as a new index to determine the time at which to begin the collision avoidance maneuver.     

Adaptive Autopilot Design of Time-Varying Uncertain Ships With Completely Unknown Control Coefficient

This paper develops an adaptive course controller for time-varying parametric uncertain nonlinear ships with completely unknown time-varying bounded control coefficient. The proposed design method does not require any a priori knowledge of the sign of the unknown time-varying control coefficient. The designed adaptive autopilot can guarantee the regulation of the ship course to any prescribed accuracy and the global uniform ultimate boundedness of all signals in the closed-loop system. The effectiveness of the presented autopilot has been demonstrated in a simulation involving a ship of 45 m in length.     

A method for breach assessment onboard a damaged passenger ship

Reliable analysis of stability and safety level in a flooding emergency onboard a damaged passenger ship is extremely important for making correct decisions on evacuation and abandonment. Thus there is demand for an automated system that detects flooding and analyzes the severity of the situation. This procedure requires estimation of the actual breach in the hull, and calculation of possible progressive flooding to undamaged compartments. A new approach to the breach assessment, based on measurement data from the flood level sensors, is presented. The developed method is complemented by time-domain flooding simulations in order to separate progressive flooding from direct inflow through the breaches in the hull of the damaged ship. The developed approach is tested and demonstrated with a large passenger ship design for various damage scenarios. The results show that the size and location of the breach can be evaluated with reasonable accuracy on the basis of the level sensor data, provided that there are enough well-placed, working level sensors.     

Propulsion of single-screw ships

On the basis of the little clause in the “Outline Specification” for a new ship: “Trial speed at a load draught of … with the engine at maximum continuous rating has to be …” some aspects regarding propulsion of single-screw ships are discussed, especially the problem of how to combine the hull form, the propeller and the machinery for propulsion in such a way that an optimal solution is obtained.In order to limit the problem, only ships provided with a single conventional propeller for propulsion are considered.A parameter study of a single-screw vessel has been done in order to get some concrete information on the interaction between ship, engine and propeller, and to investigate how the ship propeller power curve should be placed in relation to the engine operation area and to investigate changes in this relationship when the conditions change.     

Evaluation of manoeuvring coefficients of a self-propelled ship using a blade element momentum propeller model coupled to a Reynolds averaged Navier Stokes flow solver

The use of an unsteady computational fluid dynamic analysis of the manoeuvring performance of a self-propelled ship requires a large computational resource that restricts its use as part of a ship design process. A method is presented that significantly reduces computational cost by coupling a blade element momentum theory (BEMT) propeller model with the solution of the Reynolds averaged Navier Stokes (RANS) equations. The approach allows the determination of manoeuvring coefficients for a self-propelled ship travelling straight ahead, at a drift angle and for differing rudder angles. The swept volume of the propeller is divided into discrete annuli for which the axial and tangential momentum changes of the fluid passing through the propeller are balanced with the blade element performance of each propeller section. Such an approach allows the interaction effects between hull, propeller and rudder to be captured. Results are presented for the fully appended model scale self-propelled KRISO very large crude carrier 2 (KVLCC2) hull form undergoing static rudder and static drift tests at a Reynolds number of 4.6×10⁶ acting at the ship self-propulsion point. All computations were carried out on a typical workstation using a hybrid finite volume mesh size of 2.1×10⁶ elements. The computational uncertainty is typically 2–3% for side force and yaw moment.     

Probabilistic modeling of ship powering performance using full-scale operational data

The energy efficiency of ocean-going vessels can be increased through various operational considerations, such as improved cargo arrangements and weather routing. The first step toward the goal of maximizing the energy efficiency is to analyze how the ship's powering performance changes under different operational settings and weather conditions. However, existing analytical models and empirical methods have limitations in reliably estimating the powering performance of full-scale ships in real operating conditions. In this study, machine learning techniques are employed to estimate the powering performance of a full-scale ship by constructing regression models using the ship's operational data. In order to minimize the risk of overfitting in the regression process, domain knowledge based on physical principles is combined into the regression models. Also, the uncertainty of the estimated performance is evaluated with consideration of the environmental uncertainties. The obtained regression models can be used to predict the ship speed and engine power under different operational settings and weather conditions.     

海洋调查测量信息系统(一):硬件部分

在调查测量船的设计论证过程中,针对调查测量设备信息综合处理和任务指挥控制的需求,基于对调查测量船典型装备配置及能力的分析,提出了由软硬件两部分组成的调查测量信息系统,设计了由数据采集分发平台、声学同步控制模块和数据远程通信模块组成的系统硬件部分,实现了调查测量信息的集中采集、实时分发、远程传输,以及调查测量作业的同步控制,有效保证了调查测量船装备布局的统一性和科学性,为海上同步高效作业能力的生成提供了硬件保障。     

Marine sediment acoustic measurement system

This paper describes a system that has been developed to measure compressional wave speed in cored marine sediments onboard ship. The structure enables one to secure an extruded core sample to its base and to move acoustic probes to a desired location, implant them to a specified depth into the sample and perform the measurement. The acoustic measurement system is a pulse-time delay system measuring time difference over a fixed path length and the temperature of the sediment. The time difference and temperature measurement systems are comprised of task oriented components and are housed in a single portable box. The system is adaptable to the various sample sizes obtained with the coring apparatus presently in use. Initial field tests indicate that ship motion has no effect on the system. Data collected from cores has been classified according to sediment type and displays good agreement with data presented by Hamilton (1970). The difference in compressional wave velocity, based on sediment type, for the two studies is 5 m per sec.     

Multi-Innovation Gradient Iterative Locally Weighted Learning Identification for A Nonlinear Ship Maneuvering System

This paper explores a highly accurate identification modeling approach for the ship maneuvering motion with fullscale trial. A multi-innovation gradient iterative (MIGI) approach is proposed to optimize the distance metric of locally weighted learning (LWL), and a novel non-parametric modeling technique is developed for a nonlinear ship maneuvering system. This proposed method's advantages are as follows: first, it can avoid the unmodeled dynamics and multicollinearity inherent to the conventional parametric model; second, it eliminates the over-learning or underlearning and obtains the optimal distance metric; and third, the MIGI is not sensitive to the initial parameter value and requires less time during the training phase. These advantages result in a highly accurate mathematical modeling technique that can be conveniently implemented in applications. To verify the characteristics of this mathematical model, two examples are used as the model platforms to study the ship maneuvering.     

The optimization of ship weather-routing algorithm based on the composite influence of multi-dynamic elements (II): Optimized routings

The ship routing problem can be known as a multi-objective problem. Since the operation strategy is influenced by ocean environments, e.g. wind, waves or ocean currents, it is therefore weather routed. In this study, the three-dimensional modified isochrone (3DMI) method utilizing the recursive forward technique and floating grid system for the ship tracks is applied to globally search for the optimum route. The proposed method considers two types of routing strategies, i.e. ETA (Estimated Time of Arrival) routing and FUEL (FUEL-saving) routing, with different constraints, such as land boundaries, significant wave heights, engine revolution speeds and roll responses. As a result, it is verified that the robustness of the proposed method appears to be a practical tool by adjusting the safety threshold for the trade-off of ship efficiency and economics.