On Naval Architecture: A Treatise Courtesy of the NE Marickovich School of Naval Architecture

Dear Readers:

Ages ago I published my famous Treatise on Naval Architecture.  It was, and may prove to be, this blog's biggest hit.

I removed it to make some alterations to the forward, which was in very poor taste.  But those alterations have been made (basically the forward has been removed) and now I am pleased to present, in its second edition but without any great alteration (aside from the code for online exclusive content that is going to force you into buying a new book):

 On Naval Architecture:  

A Treatise Courtesy of the NE Marickovich School of Naval Architecture.

1.  INTRODUCTION

This is a ship:

Figure 1:  Aircraft Carrier (photo courtesy of US Navy)

So is this:

Figure 2:  Destroyer (photo courtesy of US Navy)

This is NOT a ship, but rather a boat (kinda sorta maybe).  It is important not to insult the Commanding Officer of any craft, and so if you are unsure of whether a floating object is a ship or a boat, it is best simply to call it a "vessel".

Figure 3:  Bass Boat (photo courtesy of the Confederate States of 'Merica Naval Defense Force and Bass Fishin Club)

Amazingly, all of the vessels above are subject to the same naval architecture rules.

2.  BUOYANCY and FLOATING

Determining the buoyancy is a simple matter of applying "Sir Lancelot's Principle", as shown in Figure 4:

Figure 4:  Sir Lancelot's Principles states that if a boat weighs the same as a duck, it is made of wood, and therefore it floats in water.  It is important to note that if the boat it is made of wood, it is a witch, and therefore upon decommissioning it must be burned at the stake.

3.  SURVIVABILITY

Building an "unsinkable ship" is virtually impossible, and even building a "sink resistant" ship costs a lot of money.  The best thing is to design and operate ships so that they are less likely to strike or be struck by an object that is going to do them harm.  Here are four simple survivability rules:

Rule Number One:  Avoid Ice burgs

Rule Number Two:  The best defense is a good offense (see section 5)

Rule Number Three:  Watch out for submarines (good luck with that).

Rule Number Four:  If John McCain comes aboard your ship, be wary. Remember, this man crashed two US Navy planes and survived; had a third plane blowed up (as he ran down the nose of the craft trying to get away) in the USS Forrestal fire and survived; got shot down in a fourth plane over North Vietnam and survived; spent eight years in a North Vietnamese prison and survived; comes back, hammers out a career as a politician, during which he has many times where he has been figuratively shot down and yet figuratively survived.  This man is either the luckiest man in the world or the unluckiest.  So, when he comes aboard, I would hedge my bets and keep a life jacket handy.  If anything, you can expect that while he is on the ship it will hit some kind of old French mine from WWI and it will sink....and yet John McCain will somehow survive.

4.  SEAKEEPING

Math.  Math math math, math math.  How do you math math math?  That's right!  Math!  Let's move on.

5.  TOPSIDE DESIGN (i.e. GUNS! MISSILES!  GET SOME!)

During concept design of any naval ship (and, let's face it, in America that is about all you are really likely to build), most questions concerning topside design start with "Dude!  You know what would be totally sweet?"  The result is figure 5.  Things usually get paired down by the cost guys later in the design spiral.  They just don't appreciate the awesomeness.

Figure 5

6.  SHIP SYSTEMS and ARRANGEMENTS

The configuration of a ship used to be an art done by an array of competent yet eccentric designers with slide rules and dip pens.  Lately, a bunch of college boys have tried to devise a computer program that would automate ship arrangements to a large extent.  If they succeed they will put good, decent, hardworking middle class Americans out of work.  Will they be stopped?  Depends on how you vote in the 2012 election.

However, in the interest of education, let's go over the theory from the Nick Parson's Project and discuss how it works.

First, you make a list of rules that are used to govern or evaluate a design.  As an example, here are the two most important rules in arrangements based on hundreds of years of naval tradition:

1.  The ice cream machine is the most important piece of equipment on any ship, but particularly on a submarine.

Note: Acronyms make the military go all wobbly in the knees, and so sometimes the Ice Cream Machine is referred to as an ICM...not to be confused with an ICBM, or InterContinental Ballistic Missile...the one time that actually happened, I can tell you, it was hilarious.  Not at the time, of course.  At the time it was a horrific clusterfuck that brought the world to the brink of nuclear catastrophe.  But as we got in the chopper after recovering the ICBMs that we had inadvertently sold as surplus to "Collis C. Collis Elementary School", I told my buddy that one day we would laugh about this.  And you know what?  I was....no, I was wrong.  It's not funny at all.  It's still absolutely terrifying to think about.    

2.  The soundness or desirability of a design is directly proportional to the proximity of the CO's stateroom to the ICM.

These rules are programmed into something called an optimization tool, which uses fuzzy math (no, its not just for politicians any more) and genetic algorithms (or divinely created algorithms, if you prefer) to evaluate a number of different designs.

For example, consider the following designs of "officer's country" aboard the SSN 825, the USS Barrack Hussein Obama:

Figure 6:  Design A

Figure 7:  Design B

Figure 8:  Design C

When we run the designs through the optimizer, we find that Design A is good, Design B is better, and Design C is the best, based on the rules.

So, clearly, we go with Design C.

7.  SHIPBUILDING

I think ship building can be summed up by the immortal words of Collis C. Collis (the C stands for Collington) when he founded a shipyard in a bucolic little town in Southeastern Virginia so many years ago:

"We Build Good Ships Here.  
But it's Gosh-Darned Expensive,
And it's Really, Really Hard.  
So Stop Whining and Ante Up."


8.  SHIP STRUCTURES

You know, when I was a lad taking European History in high school, my teacher was a retired US Navy Captain.  Consequently, he was great at teaching military history, but really awful when it came to teaching art.  So, to give us the whiff of culture we so desperately needed to become well rounded individuals, he left us in the care of Sister Wendy and her series "Sister Wendy's History of Painting", in which this little old nun with a whimsical lisp goes all over Europe talking about various masterpieces and tut tutting over all the tits and testicles that are an integral part of our shared Western cultural make-up.  

Well, I will tell you that ship structures is not my bailiwick.  So watch this video.  It will teach you everything you need to know about ship structures:

9.  CONGRATULATIONS!

Hey, you did it!  Congratulations on making it to the end of this post.  If you are not already a naval architect by trade (though in my experience as a shipbuilder everyone thinks they are a naval architect, deep down inside) you get a diploma for slogging through my "masterpiece".  It's a lot easier than slogging through 4-7 years of school.  Trust me.  

CONGRATULATIONS!  That's one for the refrigerator door!

My commencement remarks?  Use this diploma well.  Go register for Va Tech's Submarine Design Course and make sure I have something to do this summer aside from writing these epic blog posts...please! 

EXCLUSIVE ONLINE CONTENT THAT MADE YOU BUY THE NEW BOOK:

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