Hello ladies and gents this is the Viking telling you that today we are talking about
Lords of the seas: shipbuilding steel
The heads of shipbuilding and aircraft companies say that “ships and aircraft are sold by presidents,” highlighting both the complexity and the criticality of their business.
While aircraft are manufactured from such metals as titanium, aluminium and magnesium alloys, the main material used for civil vessels and warships is steel. Below, we discuss the types of steel used in shipbuilding and how they are used.
Ukraine is a unique state where both steel and ships are manufactured. More than ten shipyards on the Black Sea and the Azov Sea, the Danube River and Dnipro River build and repair warships, barges, oil tanker hulls and other marine and river machinery. After several years of stagnation, the Ukrainian shipbuilding industry has started to recover, increasing its volumes of purchased rolled metal products. Shipbuilders purchase mostly flat products manufactured by Metinvest Group’s Ukrainian steelmaking assets in Mariupol – Ilyich Steel and Azovstal.
History of shipbuilding steel
Today, it is hard to imagine a ship hull that is not made of steel.
However, things were different more than 100 years ago. Notwithstanding the fact that iron rivets were found in ancient ships in the 10th century, they were used to connect wooden parts. And this went on for several centuries. Perhaps ancient designers thought: “If iron is heavier than water, such a ship will submerge at once.” On the other hand, they were limited by Middle Age steelmaking technologies, as they did not ensure sufficient volumes of hot metal and steel smelting, as well as proper quality of materials.
The first ship with an iron hull was built at the end of the 18th century. This was a river barge.
During the 19th century, shipbuilding technologies underwent changes and improvements. While before the beginning of the 20th century, steel sheets in ship hulls were connected by means of rivets, since the 1930s the ship and vessel building technologies have become similar to the contemporary ones. Today, trade vessel and warship hulls are manufactured worldwide by cutting, bending and welding steel sheets.
These are the basic process operations that shipbuilders use to set the requirements for metallurgical products. For shipbuilders, it is important that their vessel can navigate seas and oceans without needing to repair their equipment and hulls at shipyards. This mainly relates to cargo vessels. Owners of cruise liners have their own requirements. For example, they want to have not only lighter, but also stronger hulls. This makes it possible for them to implement more interesting solutions and install additional equipment for passengers.
Metals in shipbuilding: materials used to build vessels and ships
When you speak to shipwrights, you should know a simple rule: ships are military equipment and vessels are civil equipment. However, when they are built, metals represent today’s main material. The largest tonnage falls on steel flats used to manufacture hulls and superstructures. A complete trade vessel or warship is a complex mechanism where both specific steels and non-ferrous metals are used.
Non-ferrous metals in shipbuilding
Non-ferrous metals, as a rule, are used in various equipment and hardware of vessels and ships. They are used in a much lower quantity than steel. For example, in 2016, the Spanish Navy sold a Principe de Asturias light aircraft carrier as scrap. The ship had a total weight of 8.6 thousand tonnes and contained more than 1.1 thousand tonnes of copper (including around 640 tonnes of isolated copper, i.e. cables) and about 300 tonnes of aluminium. There was also some bronze and lead. The other materials (about 7.2 thousand tonnes) were ferrous metals: steel and hot metal, as well as an insignificant amount of stainless steel.
And as always have a chilled day from the Viking
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