Future of ships

All you ever want to know about the MRT system in Singapore:

Here is the SMRT Control Room where all trains are monitored:
download

There are several Monorail systems in Singapore, but mainly for recreational use,
Sentosa Express, which replaced the earlier Sentosa Monorail:

Jurong Bird Park Panorail, which replaced the earlier Jurong Bird Park Monorail:

There is also driverless Changi Airport Sky Train between terminal:

The LRT System runs on rubber wheels on elevated tracks between blocks in some neighbourhoods:


One interesting fact:
The windows facing close by blocks will be ā€œfrostedā€ to ensure privacy for the residents.

What has all this this got to do with the future of ships??
Nothing directly, but it has to do with what has already been accomplished in other field of transport and, although no directly transferable to shipping, has some relevance.

I got one question; If these barges are going to operate autonomous, why do they need an elevatable bridge??

The mrt has been breaking down and having huge delays on a massive scale lately.
Iā€™d say way more unreliable than Londons old system

I guess when train automation fails its stops
Ship automation fails it driftsā€¦but in that situation you would have lots of backups?

OK then, enough with the trains!

Agree!!

automation is automation and autonomous is autonomous regardless of where it get used just need to adapt the technology to suit the conditions it will be used in.

Space x rocket goes up and comes back to land on a platform that it guides autonomously beneath it in the sea.

Robot vacuum cleaners

Welding robots in car plants

Iā€™ll bet lots of those engineers are wondering why some industries arent already autonomous

DP made deep water drilling possible 50 years ago

Kids can buy a drone now that they can both fly manually or programme to go somewhere and it wont crash.

DP vessels spend $10ā€™s of thousands of dollars for roll pitch and heave sensors yet for $10 you get it in a chip in a drone now.

I wonder if an INS box just went from over 50k to $50?
Every DP installation should have INS.
INS would help the course hacking issue of an autonomous vessel if you are concerned about gps spoofing but that can only be localised so near a port, E-Loran would fix that.

INS has been used extensively in aviation and although it never made a big impact in the maritime environment, it certainly would help with the accuracy of DR plots if GPS signals were to go south.

its used on DP vessels that go to certain parts of Brazil and West coast africa where they have scintillation issues every day

The legal issues with unmanned and autonomous ships of the future explored:
http://riskowner.com/unmanned-vessels-and-the-carriage-of-goods-contractual-and-insurance-considerations/

404 error when attampting to read beyond the first paragraph.

the legal issues between countries will be a big hurdle.
Local boats not so much.
If they can get around autonomous vehicles then vessels should be the same.

2019 I am in an autonomous taxi that crashes, do i hail another and just leave?

Last attempt. From the horses mouth:
https://www.clydeco.com/firm/news/view/concern-over-cyber-liability-and-lack-of-regulation-hindering-implementatio
Fairplay is good at hiding their article from free reading, but this one was originally in Hellenic Shipping. Unfortunately no longer available there.

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I think the law would consider that as leaving the scene of an accident. They would want you to stick around to provide information.

Rolls-Royce Marine AS, who are in the forefront of developing autonomous ships, are up for sale:
https://www.ft.com/content/1399b374-fb7d-11e7-9b32-d7d59aace167

This division of Rolls-Royce is situated mainly in Norway and Finland, with the HQ in Ulsteinvik and much of the design and development functions here in Aalesund.

No bidder has yet materialized, but there is obvious nervousness among the 1600 employees in Norway, the majority in Sunnmore:


(Sorry, in Nynorsk, so Google Translate will have problems)

For those who do not know how a large British Aerospace company came to get involved in the commercial Marine industry in Norway and Finland, here is a brief history, largely from memory:

In 1999 Vickers plc acquires the Ulstein Group. (This excluded Ulstein Shipyard, which remained in the ownership of the Ulstein family)

Ulstein Group was established in 1917 and manufactured a variety of marine products including propellers, azimuth units, tunnel thrusters, rudders, steering gear, deck machinery, engines and automation systems.

Rolls-Royce acquires Vickers plc to form a new commercial marine division, Rolls-Royce Marine AS, with HQ in Ulsteinvik.

What RR was actually after was Vickers Naval division and their contracts, patents and facilities.
The activities in Norway and elsewhere was of secondary importance.

Incl. in this takeover was well known brands like; Bergen Diesel, Brattvaag and Rauma Winches, Frydenboe Steering gear, KaMeWa and Liaan propellers and thrusters and a whole host of lesser known entities in Scandinavia, Poland, Singapore and China.

This also included all the UT designs of offshore vessels. They later added NVC design for Fishing and commercial vessels to become a world leader in ship design, especially for complex vessels.

Since then the automation division in Aalesund and Turku, Finland has become a very important part of development of intelligent and autonomous ships.

Let us hope that any buyer isnā€™t a speculator or stripping expert who break up this well developed company to gratify their greed.

The AI people are rightly confident that they can develop the software and hardware to have a ship safely cross oceans but unless the machinery can function reliably to a standard that I have never experienced then itā€™s a house of cards. You cannot cross oceans on batteries.
The legal fraternity and the insurance industry do not have any real understanding of the present interface between the operator and AI to draft any regulations.
If we do have unmanned vessels wandering over the oceans it should provide plenty of employment for retired anchor handlers towing the vessels back to port, given the reliability issues I have experienced.

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If I havenā€™t said it enough, Iā€™ll repeat it again;
IT WILL NOT BE THE SHIPS YOU AND I SAILED ON THAT WILL BE SAILING AUTONOMOUSLY ACROSS OCEANS.
The nearest to it would be a modern CSV with DP-3 Class, but with the diesel driven generators replaced with fuel cells.

The first such crossing on a commercial voyage will only take place after all systems have been thoroughly tested and found working to near perfection. Meanwhile there will have been dozens of smaller short sea vessels and ferries in autonomous operation for some years.

I donā€™t care to consort with those of the robot race.

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