Trans RINA, Vol 152, Part A2, Intl J Maritime Eng, Apr-Jun 2010
this identification of the requirement is thus not just the start point of
the design process but also the most
difficult part of that process. Given the consequences of getting this wrong, it is also that part of the process which has the greatest impact on the end product. This challenge to “work out what is really wanted” and what can be sensibly afforded, has been typified in the architectural and urban planning professions as the “wicked problem”, i.e. working out the right requirement is more difficult than the subsequent part of the process of designing the product.
It can also explain why the
front end of the naval ship design process, in particular, is so often highly protracted – some of the argument for this can be seen from the debates Institution’s Transactions.
recorded in the
The next issue in this design process consideration is that the ship designer has many performance issues that need to be addressed. Clearly a lot of these will be associated with the perceived primary role of a given new vessel. However there remain general ship performance design issues, summarised by terms such as “S5”. Of these Speed (really Resistance and Propulsion issues), Stability, Strength and Seakeeping have been traditional disciplines for the naval architect (with a significant contribution,
aspects, from the marine engineer). The final “S5” item, that of “Style”, was coined to cover a wider range of stylistic issues, including margin policy, adaptability, survivability and a host of standards [4]. Some of these style issues have traditionally only been addressable some way into the design process, although increasingly the developments in computation and research are making these issues more amenable to consideration early in the design process. However, does require the environment in which the design is undertaken to be organised in a responsive manner able to provide the added investment in design effort that this entails.
particularly regarding the propulsion
It is axiomatic that naval architecture is the profession most directly concerned with the design of ships. As such naval architects may be considered to be the maritime equivalent of architects of the built environment, but there are significant differences from the design practice for that environment. This is due to naval architecture becoming one of the engineering professions, to which the early Transactions bear eloquent witness. Thus naval architects provide the
equivalent of the built
environment’s civil/structural engineering capability, but remain the ship design equivalent to the architect, in providing the holistic design input. However, since the founding of the naval architectural profession in the ninetieth century, it has focused its education and research on the application of the
disciplines of
engineering science rather than the core skill of ship design, which was, traditionally, left to be “learnt on the job”. Finally, this review may, for what has now become an international institution, seem a little UK centric but, of course, for the majority of the last 150 years Britain
was internationally dominant, in both the naval and mercantile sectors.
2. SHIP DESIGN 1860 TO 1910
A perusal of K C Barnaby’s Herculean survey of the first 100 years of the INA’s existence as a learned society, for papers relevant to ship design, shows that the first half of that century was dominated by the setting up of the profession of naval architecture and coping with the incredible rate of the technical advances. The latter is exemplified by the difference between HMS Warrior (1860) and HMS Neptune (1910) or even the unique Great Eastern (1860) and RMS Mauretania (1908), all discussed
in innovation that Transaction occurred is “Freeboard papers. The degree “Steel”; Naval and Merchant of of indicated by Barnaby’s
summary titles for each decade: “Iron Ships, Turrets or Casements”;
and Froude’s Experiments”; Ship Developments”;
”Boilers”; Triumph of Steam Turbines”. The earliest papers on ship design per se were on naval ships and the arguments for armour and for twin screws. The 1873 discussion
the “extraordinary” Devastation were
heated and characterised by the major involvement of very senior naval officers. This seemed to be the pattern with the Chief Constructor of the Navy (Director of Naval Construction (DNC)
from 1875 to 1960) often
having to defend new designs against both the profession and senior sailors. This open discussion of the latest designs, described by Sir Nathaniel Barnaby as “an annual pillory”, reached a peak in Sir William White’s 1889 defence of the Royal Sovereign design where the chairman Lord Hamilton, the First Lord of the Admiralty, said White “effectively flattened out Reed” (the previous DNC and still sniping from the wings).
While there were also papers on Russian, Italian and American naval ship designs, there was less discussion on the overall design of specific merchant ships, rather such papers focussed on specific technologies associated with steel, tonnage and marine engineering. Brunel’s “Great Ship”, the Great Eastern, was belatedly discussed in Elgar’s 1893 paper comparing it with the “new Cunarders Campania and Lucania” and once again in 1907. There were papers on novel merchant ships, such as Scott Russell’s of 1870 on Train Ferries, Reed’s bizarre
1875 Bessemer with a “swinging various contributions by Martell of saloon”,
Eldridge’s 1891 paper on “Bulk Oil Tankers” and Smith’s of 1905 on the Antarctic Ship Discovery. A near equivalent to the naval design “debates” would seem to be the
Lloyd’s
defending the Rules and bulkhead division standards, but there could not said to be papers on merchant ship design practice – perhaps the rate and diversity of development was too great to take such stock. Again, in the naval ship design discussions
papers, in 1902 Laird Clowes’
“Recent scientific developments and the future of naval warfare” and in 1903 “The effect of modern accessories on the size and cost of warships” by Whiting, show an intent to discuss sensitive design issues and engage the
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©2010: The Royal Institution of Naval Architects
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