Tanker operators may need to follow Diamond S Shipping’s lead and replace voyage data recorders that have exceeded their service life
Diamond S Shipping is replacing voyage data recorders (VDRs) across its fleet of product tankers after routine maintenance revealed that existing data recorders were operating beyond their service life. This tanker group appointed Mackay World Service, a division of Mackay Communications, to rectify the situation.
During regular bridge equipment servicing, engineers identified that the original VDRs on 30 of these tankers were reaching the end of their service lives and therefore it would not be possible to fix problems they might have.
One challenge was finding a suitable replacement system and retrofit Diamond S Shipping’s fleet with minimal loss of sea time. Mackay decided to install Danelec Marine’s DM100 VDRs on the ships as replacements for the existing ones.
Danelec Marine chief executive Hans Ottosen said that other tanker operators may also need to consider replacing VDRs that were installed to meet the original IMO carriage requirements that came into force in 2002. “VDRs may have met or exceeded their design service life,” he explained to Marine Electronics and Communications.
“They are becoming expensive to maintain and service. Many of these products are no longer supported by their manufacturers, and in some cases the supplier is no longer in business.”
When replacing an older VDR, the new installation must meet the new IMO specification, which came into effect in July 2014. Danelec Marine’s DM100 VDR is fully type-approved to this 2014 standard.
Mr Ottosen said a type-approved DM100 VDR exceeds the regulatory requirements and incorporates new features that were not previously available in marine VDR systems. It has Danelec’s exclusive SoftWare Advanced Protection (SWAP) technology, which is built into the system architecture for serviceability, and the DanelecConnect remote data gateway for ship-to-shore transfer.
“All system programming and configurations are stored on a hot-swappable memory card,” he explained. When the unit requires servicing, a technician removes this card and re-inserts it into a new VDR unit. “Instantly, the replacement unit is fully functional and the technician can take the old one away for repair ashore without delaying the ship’s departure,” said Mr Ottosen.
By the beginning of April, 26 of the 30 tankers had been retrofitted by Mackay Marine India in Mumbai. Mr Ottosen described the process: “Normally, removing an obsolete VDR and replacing it with a new unit would involve many hours of labour for the installing technician, since the existing components are often not compatible with the new technology.
To solve this problem, Danelec Marine developed a range of conversion kits to replace more than 45 different models of VDRs and simplified VDRs (S-VDRs), including all major existing and legacy brands. “The conversion kits provide specific sets of hardware, software and data interfaces tailored to each VDR model,” he said.
The mechanical kits include pre-drilled adaptor plates and mounting brackets for the main unit, memory capsule and bridge microphones. They also include remote data interfaces for serial, analogue and digital connections and a software tool for converting old configuration files. In many cases, existing sensor modules and cables can be reused, saving extensive time and effort on the part of installing technicians.
“We have been able to accelerate the installation process with zero equipment failures, ensuring that ships’ schedules were not disrupted”
“By conducting pre-install site surveys on each class of vessel and using the Danelec Marine conversion kits, we have been able to accelerate the installation process with zero equipment failures, ensuring that ships’ schedules were not disrupted,” said Mackay Marine India managing director Ram Sitaraman. “The typical installation time was 18-24 hours per ship.”
According to Danelec Marine, this is a reduction in installation time of 25-50%, compared with conventional VDR installations, saving time and money and minimising downtime for the ship.
By streamlining a fleet-wide VDR retrofit, Diamond S Shipping has been able to minimise downtime and gain significantly enhanced features and operational efficiencies, said Mr Ottosen.
Diamond S Shipping operates US$1.1Bn fleet
According to VesselsValue, the total value of the Diamond S Shipping fleet is US$1.1Bn, and the average age is eight years old. Diamond S Shipping burst onto the product tanker scene in 2010 when its founder, Craig Stevenson, raised US$1Bn through equity capital and a further US$1Bn of debt financing to purchase 30 recently-delivered product tankers en bloc from Hong Kong owner Cido Shipping.
Among the investors was WL Ross & Co, the private equity fund that is managed by the famed distressed assets investor, Wilbur Ross, who is currently US president Donald Trump’s commerce secretary.
Fast-forward to 2012 and the fleet had grown to 33 tankers, with an average age of three years, with thoughts of retrofitting communications equipment a distant cell on a spreadsheet. The group’s fleet has grown to 45 vessels this year, with the purchase of two more product tankers and the addition of a fleet of crude oil tankers.
Teekay deploys email platform on 160 ships
Teekay Shipping is upgrading email services for crew serving on up to 160 vessels worldwide with a platform developed by Dualog. During Q1 2018, these email platforms were installed on more than 100 ships in that fleet.
With more than three-fifths of the installation project completed, Teekay has seen improvements in cyber security and uptime from these ships’ email communications, said Dualog international sales manager Thomas Heide. By the end of Q2 2018, all of Teekay’s ships will have this updated email platform.
Mr Heide said that planning and pilot trials of Dualog’s email system enabled quicker upgrades on the rest of the ships. “Teekay ships are starting to see strong operational benefits from what is a web-based email system,” he said.
Teekay regional and vessel systems IT manager Stuart Mackenzie said “a lot of planning was carried out across a number of our network of offices.” These included Glasgow, Scotland, Manila in the Philippines, Vancouver, Canada, and Singapore.
“After some fine-tuning of the systems following the results of the pilot project, we began the process of upgrading the email systems on the fleet,” Mr Mackenzie said. “We saw the need for a more modern and proven maritime email solution, which included a file transfer solution built in.”
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