Maersk obtained both a two-year warranty (other shipyards offer one-year warranties) and a so called “tail-heavy” payment: 40% during construction and 60% after Maersk has conducted sea trials after delivery. Each ship took about a year to build (Daewoo has large enough facilities to build three such ships at a time). The ferocious competition between Asian shipyards, and especially the Big Three of Korea (Daewoo, Hyundai, and Samsung) allowed Maersk to get excellent financial conditions on hull construction and system assembly/integration. This is the largest contract ever for commercial vessels of any kind. Each of the three series of 10 Triple E container ships cost Maersk $1.9 billion, bringing the total for all 30 ships to US $5.7 billion in 2016 dollars. So, just in case, according to both Maersk and Daewoo, the Triple-E were designed to be “easy to break up” when their time comes, but until that day comes we won’t know how much truth there is in this statement.Īll of this comes at a price. The Triple-E 25-year design lifespan may be cut short if there are technical breakthroughs that make the ships uneconomical to run, repair, or retrofit. This increased electricity generation allows each Triple-E ship to carry up to 1,800 climate-controlled containers, a huge boon when carrying heat-sensitive cargo (such as some electronic components) through the hot Indian Ocean. It allows to install one 3000 kW electric generator per shaft, thus almost doubling power from thermal-fired generators and the waste heat recovery (WHR) system. For example, the much celebrated 14 cylinder version of the Wärtsilä RTA96C is rated for over 80,000kW.īut MAN’s twin-engine configuration allows to reduce engine room size relative to the size of the ship, thus giving more room for cargo. These MAN engines are not the most efficient offering from the German firm, and there are several single engines that put out a lot more power. Their combined power of 59,000 kW allows the monster-ship to cruise at 16 knots. The engines are designed to deliver their maximum efficiency at 73 rpm. Each engine has eight cylinders with an 800 mm bore. To give an example of what the shipping industry demands nowadays, Maersk’s Triple-E container ships – the largest container ships in the world with a capacity of over 18,000 twenty-foot-container equivalent units (TEU) – are powered by two MAN two-stroke diesels, each driving its own propeller. Technical solutions range from the use of plates of corrosion-resistant materials such as Inconel (a family of nickel-based super-alloys originally developed for jet engines) welded to the piston crown to using crankcase oil to cool not just the pistons themselves but the rod as well to reduce the likelihood of heat-induced failures. Several shipowners (led by CMA CGM) are coming to like the single engine/single propeller configuration for its efficiency and reduced running costs – as long as it doesn’t impact cruising speed too much. The shipping industry does not merely demand cleaner and more fuel-efficient engines, but also engines that will last the design life of the ship (usually 25 years) with only scheduled maintenance and minimal repairs. Stricter environmental legislation around the world is only part of the increasingly more challenging environment these three firms – and the shipyards and contractors they work with – have to deal with. Three engine manufacturers have come to dominate the market for the giant low-speed two-stroke diesel engines used in the largest container ships, bulk carriers, and tankers: MAN SE of Germany, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries of Japan, and Wärtsilä of Finland. By MC01, a frequent commenter on WOLF STREET:
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