
Innovative container ship features hemispherical bow - jasoncartwright
http://asia.nikkei.com/Tech-Science/Tech/Innovative-container-ship-features-hemispherical-bow
======
sevenless
I always thought the reason ships have a "bulbous bow" is interesting. Also
it's fun to say!
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulbous_bow#How_it_works](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulbous_bow#How_it_works)

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acd
Green idea: One could skip the bow and replace it with CCTV HD cameras and
keep the crew in ground level on the middle of the ship where it will be least
rocky. Shouldnt that reduce air drag even more?

Something similar with CCTV has been done for remote air traffic control
towers. [http://www.popularmechanics.com/flight/a20075/saab-remote-
ai...](http://www.popularmechanics.com/flight/a20075/saab-remote-air-traffic/)

Also add superhydrophobic coating and or supercavitation to reduce the water
drag. That should be able to reduct fuel consumption even more.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supercavitation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supercavitation)
[http://www.gizmag.com/ghost-super-cavitating-military-
boat/2...](http://www.gizmag.com/ghost-super-cavitating-military-boat/21137/)
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superhydrophobic_coating](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superhydrophobic_coating)
[https://www.rochester.edu/newscenter/superhydrophobic-
metals...](https://www.rochester.edu/newscenter/superhydrophobic-
metals-85592/)

~~~
madaxe_again
Go a step further, make the ship autonomous, run them in flotillas and have an
engineer or two between the whole lot for any mechanical issues. they could
have luxurious staterooms, given that you'd need only a few crew for a dozen
ships.

~~~
protomyth
Rolls-Royce is really pushing the fully automated ships [http://www.rolls-
royce.com/media/press-releases/yr-2016/pr-2...](http://www.rolls-
royce.com/media/press-releases/yr-2016/pr-2016-03-22-rr-reveals-future-shore-
control-centre.aspx)

~~~
drcross
This screams of PR vaporware.

~~~
protomyth
That is a PR release but it is far from vaporware. They have been working on
the systems, procedures, and logistics for years. You might want to look into
their progress and the industry coverage.

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leoedin
The car carrier mentioned in the article is pictured here:
[http://www.solasolv.com/news/city.php](http://www.solasolv.com/news/city.php)

Definitely an interesting design. In my eyes it looks like it should be
unstable - I guess we're naturally inclined to think of curved parts of ships
as being the underwater parts.

~~~
krisoft
That might be, but it might also be just how car carriers look like. If you do
an image search for "roro ship" (roro=roll on/roll off, the official name for
them) then you can see that all have huge freeboard. To me they all look
unsteady. A particularly nice example is the MV Cougar Ace lying on its side.
(
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MV_Cougar_Ace#/media/File:Coug...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MV_Cougar_Ace#/media/File:Cougar_Ace_on_side_\(starboard_side\).jpg)
)

~~~
radicalbyte
It is indeed how they look. Also, the blue bit is pretty much all under water
when the ship is loaded with 2000 tonnes of cars..

~~~
jabl
Er, no. If so, e.g. the anchor would be underwater when fully loaded.

My guess is that the green belt is about the difference between empty and
fully loaded.

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punnerud
Will be interesting if Ulstein will go to court to stop the boat or not,
because they have a design protection and patents on a several similar designs
to reduce air-drag:
[https://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?depth=1&...](https://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?depth=1&nv=1&rurl=translate.google.com&sl=no&tl=en&u=http://www.tu.no/artikler/virgin-
ville-bygge-cruiseskip-med-x-
bow/275487&usg=ALkJrhiLPVGp0ibPwF471RmSfjml12CCBw)

~~~
semi-extrinsic
I don't think so. The X-bow is for lowering water resistance, this is a
conventional bow below the waterline, hemispherical above to reduce air drag.

------
supergreg
Interesting this was patentable, it's just applying a known concept (a shape
that cuts wind resistance) to ships.

~~~
jws
Boat hulls and decks have specific laws which make them patentable.

In 1988 Florida tried to make a law protecting boat hull designs and was shot
down by the US Supreme Court. Legislators got involved and so part of the 1998
Digital Millennium Copyright Act includes protection of hull designs.

The rationale is: As a boat maker you have experts do a lot of very expensive
work with thinking, simulation, real world modeling, building and testing full
sized prototypes sweating all the little fiddly details. You finally stumble
upon a good hull for some market. Then you spend dump truck loads of marketing
money to convince people that it is a good hull for their boating needs.
Success! So some clown then borrows one of the boats, makes a mold, and starts
selling them cheaper with no R&D expenses and customers flock to him because
they can tell its "just like" your boat.

Fun legal/programmer note: The law had to be fixed in 2009 because some of
aforesaid clowns figured out that "hull" was defined to be the hull and the
deck, so they were making molds, copying the hull and changing an irrelevant
detail on the deck and counting as a different design. The 2009 law splits
hull and deck, fixes a bunch of AND and OR logic, and closes that bug report
on the law.

~~~
mc32
So that piques my curiosity, why don't car manufacturers go the same route?

Apparently in some parts of the world some new car MFGs copy the look and feel
of more expensive cars and other than complain a bit, the other manufacturers
don't seem to enter into litigation with each other over design much --given
the very similar designs some models have.

~~~
Zak
Probably because car manufacturers haven't lobbied the relevant governments
successfully. I suspect in many cases, the companies doing the copying are
local and therefore have more influence over the relevant government than the
foreign company that originated the design.

We also see a lot of cases where the copying isn't really copying. The first
generation of Lexus IS300, for example was a compact rear wheel drive luxury
sedan with an inline six engine and sporty handling. Most car people reading
that description would immediately think "BMW 3-series", and that was, of
course the best-known entry in market the IS300 was intended for. It's hardly
a clone though; no component was directly copied from BMW, the styling was
clearly not intended to be mistaken for a BMW product, the engine was already
used in other Toyota products, etc....

------
rosser
I've often wondered why so much of our transportation infrastructure appears
to utterly discount things like aerodynamics. Planes and (some) passenger cars
pay attention, but trucks, tractor-trailers, trains, and buses are basically
moving bricks, slamming into the air in front of them, and dragging a partial
vacuum behind them. Awfully fuel-inefficient, that.

~~~
imaginenore
Ships, out of all modes of transportation, could use the wind to really reduce
the fuel consumption. Giant kites that are fully automatic should be able to
drag even the largest ships.

~~~
rosser
I actually posted another comment, previously in this story's discussion,
mentioning high-altitude kite propelled container ships. You'd probably still
need to burn something (or somehow otherwise) turn screws for maneuvering and
propulsion in coastal waters, but that's a small fraction of the fuel burned
each crossing.

~~~
nradov
No even with kite propulsion cargo ships will still need to run the main
engine constantly. Wind just isn't strong enough to push a huge ship through
the water a reasonable speed using a relatively small kite. See the other link
in the sibling post; total fuel consumption with a kite is only 5% lower.

[http://www.skysails.info/english/skysails-marine/skysails-
pr...](http://www.skysails.info/english/skysails-marine/skysails-propulsion-
for-cargo-ships/advantages/)

~~~
imaginenore
With one specific kite. Nothing stops you from adding multiple kites, and
larger ones too.

~~~
nradov
There are practical limits to kite size in order to keep them controllable.
And where would you put multiple kites? Deck space is at a premium and they
won't sacrifice cargo capacity.

~~~
rosser
Currently, yes.

Currently, aeons-decomposed dinosaurs are still plentiful enough that we're
profligately burning them, at our own peril, too.

Both of those things will change.

------
miander
I'm biased, but I feel like if they really cared about the environment they
would encourage licensing this instead of keeping it to themselves.

~~~
radiorental
Patenting often precludes licensing. Lowering fuel costs is not synonymous
with environmental concern.

~~~
masklinn
> Patenting often precludes licensing.

Don't you mean "precedes"? You can't license something you don't have the
rights to.

~~~
radiorental
Good catch, my grammar is off.

Licensing is precluded by a lack of patenting.

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MereKatMoves
[http://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/details/ships/shipid:372...](http://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/details/ships/shipid:3727868/mmsi:431007132/vessel:NATORI)

This is the ship currently afloat with the SSS bow

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Theodores
This still seems a long way off the 'marginal gains' in aero that F1, cycling
or the world of aerospace are chasing. Which is not really a surprise, I guess
the winds they are 'cheating' here are the sort of extreme winds you feel on a
seafront at the end of a terrace of big buildings, the sort you cannot stand
up in. I imagine rounding the edges off does the job even if 'laminar flow'
isn't quite as it is in F1.

~~~
skosch
Well, wind speeds relative to the vehicle are probably higher in F1, no?

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delinka
Is this about the bow or the bridge? This[1] looks like a hemispherical bow to
me. The article talks about wind tunnel tests, making me think they're not
talking about under-water features. Are air-based tests valid for fluids with
such drastically different density and viscosity (e.g. salt water)?

[1] -
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulbous_bow#/media/File:Constr...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulbous_bow#/media/File:Construction_of_HMS_Queen_Elizabeth_MOD_45157272.jpg)

Edited to add: it seems that the "bow" is "the front of the ship"[2] and not
specifically any part above or below the water. Looks like in this particular
design, the bridge is at the bow, and the bow is round.

[2] -
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bow_%28ship%29](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bow_%28ship%29)

~~~
Terretta
'Prow' would have been clearer.

But bow's fine too.

"The prow is the forward-most part of a ship's bow that cuts through the
water. The prow is the part of the bow above the waterline. The terms prow and
bow are often used interchangeably to describe the most forward part of a ship
and its surrounding parts."

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krisoft
Isn't the bridge usually at the stern on container ships? I thought that's
because the engines are in the back, and you don't want to make the controls
travel a lot. Wonder how this is solved here?

~~~
jabl
Usually it makes sense to put the deck house right on top of the engine room.
Less wasted cargo space, think funnels, cargo hatches etc. Also, the engine
room people appreciate being able to get to their sleeping quarters and the
canteen with dry shoes.

Further, putting the engine room as far towards the aft as possible also makes
sense, shorter and cheaper propshaft and less cargo space wasted for it
either.

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Zigurd
Cargo ships are still pretty dirty

[http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1229857/How-1...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1229857/How-16-ships-
create-pollution-cars-world.html)

Alt fuels would make a much larger impact

~~~
rosser
Per ton-mile, they're far and away the energy- and emissions-cheapest form of
bulk transport we have. Someday, we'll pull container ships by high-altitude
kite or something, but until then, 50+% thermal efficiencies aren't something
to dismiss out of hand.

~~~
Zigurd
That's the good part. The bad part is that bunker oil is the opposite of a
petroleum distillate. It's what's left over. So it has all the sulfur and
other contaminants you want to get rid of for other refinery products. The
difference is enormous: hundreds of times the sulfur vs refined fuels, etc.

------
tikumo
The next step is to make it dented like a golfball..

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mc32
Why did they have to patent the shape?

Is that part and parcel of ship building? Do cars and trucks and planes also
patent the look and feel of their vehicles? Sometimes the lines of a Hyundai
are not all that distinct from a Mecedes, so, could another shipbuilder just
slightly change the design and not infringe?

~~~
bluejekyll
Did they actually get awarded the patent? It might still be snaking it's way
through the long application process, which could mean that it might not meet
the rules regarding non-obvious inventions.

~~~
bobwaycott
According to the article:

> _The ship 's distinctive design, which was patented in Japan, the U.S.,
> South Korea, China and seven European countries, helps improve fuel
> efficiency._

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dghughes
That looks expensive I wonder how much it costs and how hard it is to
construct the curved parts.

~~~
Retra
The underside of the ship is probably already curved and they've been making
them that way for a while, so I'd imagine ship builders to have plenty of
experience with this sort of thing.

~~~
niels_olson
The design work costs less than the steel for the first bow and bridge.

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bawana
Why move the bridge? Just build a fairing over the bow and put a bunch of tv
cameras on it.

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ChuckMcM
I think the spherical shape is cool, but I'm surprised they actually put it on
the bow. I wonder about vertical motion of the bow which always seems more
pronounced than midships or aft during a heavy storm.

~~~
dmoy
They may just not optimize for heavy storm performance. What % of the time is
a ship in a heavy storm?

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zackmorris
This is cool and everything but it distracts from the fact the water drag is 2
(maybe 3?) of orders of magnitude larger than air drag. It might have been a
better investment to install vortex generators on the hull (these work like
the dimples in golfballs to reduce the vacuum formed behind the moving body).
I may be wrong about this, for example if laminar flow is better in an
incompressible fluid.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vortex_generator](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vortex_generator)

~~~
zazen
I find this comment very puzzling. A team of experts spent months or years
designing and building a ship. Are you really suggesting they just forgot
about the hydrodynamic drag? If the first thing that pops into your head was
actually a "better investment", don't you think they might have managed to
think of it too?

~~~
zackmorris
I'm sure they optimized hydrodynamic drag too. My point was that aerodynamic
drag is so much lower that the bow of the ship could have been shaped like a
pokemon and it would have made almost no difference on overall efficiency. An
analogy would be putting a nose cone on a train. It looks cool and everything
but the train is still going to lose half its thermodynamic efficiency (or
more) just burning oil. Whereas jumping to electric reclaims all that, and I
was trying to make a similar point that higher gains might be found elsewhere
for shipping.

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otaviokz
I can only imagine how much head ache they had until someone came up with the
"Shape" to add an extra 'S' in order to avoid the "SS" acronym.

Fun and games aside, it seems a great idea.

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carapace
Kind of a _non sequitur_ , but I once found a flyer on the sidewalk in Boulder
CO that advocated for inclining airplane runways by, I forget, 5% or so.

The idea was that departing flights would take off in the downward-sloping
direction, gaining boost to momentum from gravity, while incoming flights
would land uphill making it easier to brake.

I have no idea if this would actually work, but the idea has stuck with me.

~~~
lisper
Some runways in mountainous areas are built this way out of necessity. The
best known is this one:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Courchevel_Altiport](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Courchevel_Altiport)

[https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Courchevel+Alti...](https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Courchevel+Altiport)

It makes for some really dramatic landings. Upon touchdown you have to apply
full power, or you might not make it to the top of the runway. Also, there is
no go-around. You either land successfully, or you crash. There is no third
option.

The take-off is quite a ride too.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6Wr3ilAWpo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6Wr3ilAWpo)

~~~
kimburgess
Ditto for Lukla Airport:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenzing%E2%80%93Hillary_Airpor...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenzing%E2%80%93Hillary_Airport)

Just to add to the fun it's at 2,845m too. Take off seems to be not some much
about lift, but rather not falling too much when you drop off the end of the
runway. It's an experience.

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andrewfromx
of course this article makes front page of hn, it's about containers!

~~~
noonespecial
And shipping. Real hackers ship.

~~~
GFK_of_xmaspast
The only fanfic HN appreciates is that Big Yud thing.

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cmdrfred
Is this the sister ship of the Kobayashi Maru?

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garrettdreyfus
How will this effect Docker?

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bizarref00l
Congratulations on patenting egg's shape.

