Title: Ship longitudinal structural stiffening for navigating turbulent water environment

Authors: Moses Oyaro Okello; Jian Zhang; Shi Hua

Addresses: School of Naval Architecture and Ocean Engineering, Jiangsu University of Science and Technology, Zhenjiang, Jiangsu, 212100, China ' School of Naval Architecture and Ocean Engineering, Jiangsu University of Science and Technology, Zhenjiang, Jiangsu, 212100, China ' School of Naval Architecture and Ocean Engineering, Jiangsu University of Science and Technology, Zhenjiang, Jiangsu, 212100, China

Abstract: This paper proposes techniques to enhance the longitudinal strength of cargo ships to ensure minimum stress and deformation during sagging and hogging. The first technique is stern-to-bow, which uses curve support structures to increase the longitudinal strength of a cargo ship. Another technique to stiffen a ship's lateral plate is the use of different design patterns, such as wavy curves, stars, and zigzags etc., for the side plate stiffening. In addition, structural topology optimisation is used to generate the optimal plate designs with the minimum plate mass. A numerical study on different stiffened plates with fixed supports on both ends subjected to a uniform load distribution shows that there is a decrease in both the total deformation and mass of the plate when the wavy, star, and zigzag pattern plate stiffening is used. Furthermore, curving the plate on top can increase its strength during sagging as well as hogging.

Keywords: finite element analysis; finite element method; sagging; hogging; topology optimisation; plate stiffening.

DOI: 10.1504/IJVSMT.2024.142151

International Journal of Vehicle Systems Modelling and Testing, 2024 Vol.18 No.3, pp.267 - 288

Received: 03 May 2024
Accepted: 21 Jun 2024
Published online: 10 Oct 2024 *

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