Automotive And Aerospace Industries News

Marine simulators are commonplace in the training and development of crew for large vessels. Not so much for small, fast patrol and attack craft.From the mid to late 1970s, marine simulators developed into a viable training tool for trainee mariners. Their initial popularity developed as opportunities for practical training became scarcer and a lot costlier, too. Since then, however, the advancement of the technology has brought a new dimension to professional crew training for small, fast craft.

The Department of Engineering Cybernetics at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) is leading a new Knowledge-Building Project for Industry that will study collision avoidance for advanced ships. The AUTOSEA project is sponsored by the Research Council of Norway with DNV GL, Kongsberg Maritime and Maritime Robotics as industry partners. The Maritime industry has seen an increasing focus on safety and reliability over many decades. Still the accident and casualty rates are high compared to other industries and numerous studies indicate that the majority of these accidents are caused by human errors. Recent advances…

Tokyo based classification society ClassNK has released the guidelines on the application of friction stir welding to the construction of commercial maritime vessels. The new Guidelines on Friction Stir Welding lay out clear requirements for the use of this advanced welding process for commercial shipbuilding, and are the first such guidelines to specify approval procedures for the use of friction stir welding on hull structural members. Currently, the majority of the world’s merchant vessels are constructed using semi-automatic CO2 welding and submerged arc welding. However, in recent years a number of new high performance welding processes have been developed with the aim of improving both the quality of welded joints and the efficiency of the welding process.