Author(s)

E. Lehmann, M. Bockenhauer, W. Fricke & H.J. Hansen

Abstract

Large and efficient bulk carriers, designed and built mainly in the 1960's and 1970%, are now reaching the end of their service life. The past few years have revealed several structural problems, which strongly affected the ships' safety. Although corrosion and bad maintenance was found to contribute mostly to the problems, the strength behaviour and design criteria have, nevertheless, to be reviewed taking into account the service experience observed. After describing different designs of bulk carriers and the governing structural design principles, the criteria and models for the strength assessment based on first engineering principles are summarised. Emphasis is placed on local strength analyses in order to cover fatigue aspects. Important will become also the strength analysis in flooded condition, considering extreme loads

Keywords