COMPASS CSR Software(CCS) Arrives, boosting Shipbuilding Industry

According to the resolution of IACS Council, new version of CSR rules will come into effect on July 1st, 2015.Compared with CSR BC/OT rules, IACS CSR rules coordinate oil tanker rules and bulk carrier rules in various aspects, including  design loads, longitudinal strength, local strength, Finite Element Analysis, fatigue strength，buckling strength,, and supplement rules for residual strength and structural redundancy analysis based on IMO GBS’s requirements, making the contents more comprehensive. New version rules prefer to ship mechanics on technical level and emphasize on application of computation analysis.

Despite improvement in advancement aspect, new version rules bring designers heavy calculating task meanwhile. Compared with CSR BC/OT rules, new version CSR rules demand multiple workload in the aspects of scope of assessment, working condition calculation, node evaluation, and therefore, shipbuilding industry faces the problem that how to help designers smoothly deal with the heavy calculating task and shorten the ship design period. CCS has founded a research and development team on CSR, and then the software COMPASS CSR emerges as the times require.

COMPASS CSR is a rules-computation software developed by CCS. The software is the intellectual property of CCS alone, and includes the two modules SDP (Standard Description Protocol) and DSA (Direct Strength Analysis).

Module SDP is directed at descriptive rules computation, featuring the following traits:

1. Fully covers the requirements of CSR descriptive rules;

2. Easily operated with one-button assessment system while providing accurate results;

3. All files are stored respectively, enabling the users to manage files by duplicating model data and transmitting crucial data. Engineering data can also be automatically saved, backed up, and compressed.

4. Computational outputs can be presented in the form of interfaces, cloud pictures, files, and reports, thus catering to various users of different needs.

Module DSA is designed to conduct Finite Element Analysis of hull, which can:

1. Fully covers the requirements of CSR Finite Element Analysis;

2. Based on MSC. Patran platform, it can be operated on all PATRAN versions;

3. Automatic searches for structures and cabin elements, saving the trouble of manual selection;

4. Save modeling timespan with automatic erosion reduction;

5. Define load conditions with swiftness and flexibility, while self-definition is kept as optional for users with research requirements;

6. Automatically add loads, like local loads, beam shear forces and bending moments, torques, and boundary restraints.

7. Swift post-processing with yield, buckling, and fatigue assessments automatically completed, followed by various present forms of cloud pictures and detailed output reports.

After CCS's successfully issuing the first trial version of COMPASS CSR software on 1st July 2012, with its pursuit for excellence, CCS continued upgrading the software and bore the hope of providing the best product and services for its customers. In January 2015, IACS issued Rule Change Notice 1 and Urgent Rule Change 1 to update the CSR again. Therefore, CCS updated its software in time, completely incorporating the latest rules of CSR and dramatically improving the efficiency and stability of the software. Consequently, the time span of designing and evaluation based on CSR can be further shortened.

In the aspect of Direct Strength Analysis(DSA) : after improving the way of adding loads in the new version software, computation stability gets enhanced and computation efficiency increases to more than twice of the efficiency before. In addition, computation efficiency increases dramatically by 7 or 8 times in the aspect of automatic identification of cabin elements’ normal direction and sub-model methods.

In the aspect of Standard Description Protocol(SDP) : in new version software various structure members are classified according to different colors in cloud pictures for Pre-processing and Post-processing. Hence customers could possess one clearer and more friendly interface to check models more conveniently. Besides, new version software could automatically generate various kinds of calculation reports, a direct and practical function. As for data security, new version software provides the functions of scheduled backup and model recovery, which have help to both user’s management and data security.

By the time the rules IACS CSR formally come into effect on 1st, July, 2015, the ship-industry market will be filled with orders for bulk carriers and oil tankers designed in accordance with CSR, and domestic shipyards and institutions will confront the designing and construction of these ships. By then, the software COMPASS CSR developed by CCS will be widely used in fields including structure analysis, hull forming, blueprint verifying, and operating managements, therefore serving greater purposes. Also, the technical force of CCS will continue to maintain the rules and update the software, keeping synchronization with CSR rules development and thus providing strong support for the R&D of hull forms in the domestic ship industry.