On 2/15/08, sean neill <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > ships handle rather like an over sized narrowboat, ie the most stable > point > was at the stern and NOT near the centre, like old ships. The bow was > Neil Arlidge - NB Earnest - Shannon Reg 7410 > > My guess is that this is because the bows have an excessive flare - WW2 > aircraft carriers used to suffer from slamming under the bow flare. I > don't know if cruise ships have so much flare because it is thought to > look nicer or to balance the excessive superstructure. > > Slamming can also occur because the hull is shallow-drafted and I guess > this may be the explanation for modern narrowboats.
The bow is often very large to stop waves from crashing into, and damaging the superstructure. QM2 has a large bow, but also has a wave divider/wash board to push the water back over board if it does get on the bow. The Pride of Hull suffers badly from slamming when it's really rough. It was something like a 6-7 when we first went to Holland, and occasionally the whole ship would vibrate and rattle. This seamed to be mostly because the whole bow was coming out of the water, and then slamming back down again. Many modern ships have very flat bottoms even at the bow (for cheapness no doubt). For a really well designed bow see: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTKokuV5uwg Very impressive! Cheers, Mike -- Michael Askin http://shoestring_DOT_zapto_DOT_org/
