SHIP LOADS AND STRESSES

DISTINGUISH BETWEEN STATIC

AND DYNAMIC LOADS

INTRODUCTION
The size and principal characteristics of a ship are determined
primarily by its mission, intended service, and cost. In addition to
basic functional considerations there are requirements such as
stability, low resistance, high propulsive efficiency, good
seakeeping, and various navigational restrictions on draft or beam,
all of which influence the choice of dimensions and form. The ship's
structure must be designed, within the basic constraints, to sustain
all the loads expected to arise in its seagoing environment. In
contrast to land structures, the ship does not rest on a fixed
foundation but derives its entire support from buoyant pressures
exerted by a dynamic and ever changing ocean environment, which
plays both roles of friend and foe for the ship.


The loads that the ship structure must be
designed to withstand have many sources.
There are static components which consist
principally of the weight and buoyancy of the
ship in calm waters. There are dynamic
components caused by wave induced motions of
the ship, and by slamming in waves, as well as
vibratory loads by the propeller and machinery,
all of which are of different frequency ranges.
CLASSIFICATION

It is convenient to divide the loads acting
on the ship structure into two main
categories :
Static Force
Dynamic Force
We will now look into each of these forces
in detail.
STATIC FORCE
Static loads are loads that change only when
the weight of the ship or its weight distribution
changes. These include:
1. Weight of the ship and its contents.
2. Static buoyancy of the ship at rest or moving.
3. Thermal loads resulting from temperature
gradients within the hull.
4. Concentrated loads caused by dry docking or
grounding.
They are due to:
Internal forces result from structural
weight, cargo and machinery weight.
External static forces include the
hydrostatic pressure of the water on the
hull.
Consider a ship floating in calm water. Two
different forces will be acting upon it along its
length. The weight of the ship and its contents
will be acting vertically downwards. The
buoyancy of vertical component of hydrostatic
pressure will be acting upwards. In total, the
two forces exactly equal and balance one
another such that the ship floats at a particular
draft. The centre of buoyancy force and the
centre of the weight will be vertically in line.

A transverse section of a ship is
subjected to static pressure from the
surrounding water in addition to the
resulting loading from the weight of the
structure, cargo etc. although transverse
stresses are of lesser magnitude than
longitudinal stresses, considerable
distortion of the structure could occur, in
the absence of adequate stiffening.

The structures which resist transverse
stresses are transverse bulkheads, solid
floors in the double bottom, deck beams,
side frames and the brackets between
them and adjacent structure such as tank
top flooring or margin plates.
DYNAMIC FORCES

Dynamic loads are loads that vary in time
with periods ranging from a few seconds
to several minutes. They may also be time
varying loads of sufficiently high frequency
that may induce vibratory response of the
ship structure
These can be broken dowin into the
following components:
Wave induced hull pressure variations.
Hull pressure variations caused by
transient ship motions.
Inertial reactions resulting from the
acceleration of the mass of the ship and
its contents
Hydrodynamic loads induced by propulsive
devices.
Loads imparted to the hull by reciprocating or
unbalanced machinery.
Hydro elastic loads resulting from interaction of
appendages with the flow past the ship.
Wave induced loads due primarily to short
waves whose frequency of encounter overlaps
the lower natural frequencies of hull vibration,
called springing.
They are due to:
1. The ships motion in the sea
2. The action of the wind and the waves
3. The effects of operating machinery.
A ship is free to move with 6 degrees of
freedom, 3 linear and 3 rotational. The various
forces acting on a ship are constantly varying in
degree and frequency. Consider a ship moving
along waves. Distribution of buoyancy will vary
as a result of the waves. The movement of the
ship will also introduce dynamic forces. The
ships structure will be subjected to constantly
fluctuating stresses as waves move along the
ships length.
The hull girder bending in waves takes
place continuously throughout the
seagoing lifetime of any ship. It has been
estimated that in a twenty ship lifetime, a
typical ship undergoes on the order of
hundred million such bending reversals.