An issue that arises during the execution of shipbuilding engineering projects at Royal IHC is an imbalance between the sum of all necessary engineering work, and all engineers that are employed who are available to execute the work. This research aims to develop a new method to help establish a proposal engineering work schedule forecast for all engineering work packages in custom trailing suction hopper shipbuilding projects at Royal IHC. To develop the input for the new method, regression analysis on usable historical engineering man-hour data was applied to develop models that quantify work, and curve fitting through the man-hour data was
applied to develop models that determine the timing of work.

This project analyses the feasibility of the integration of an automation system for custom-made composite part production at the superyacht equipment manufacturer Rondal BV. An analysis of the current prepreg production is performed to understand the automation opportunities and production requirements. Nesting, kitting, protective film removal and the laminating of the plies as well as de-bulking preparation for the laminate were identified as potential automation areas. The analysis also considers the labour time and cost efficiency of the production.
Various automation techniques currently applied in other composite manufacturing industries have been considered and analysed for their feasibility to the Rondal product manufacture. The focus of the analysis was to keep the current manufacturing steps, while reducing labour hours and lead time. The proposed system has also been assessed in terms of its future advancement by considering its current state of development within the industry. Based on this analysis the most appropriate automation solution is the “Pick and Place (P&P) cell” concept. Its capabilities and flexibility recommend it as a suitable candidate to be implemented in the automated manufacture of the variety of Rondal products.
Challenges of each individual equipment within the P&P cell and their interactions are described in detail. Predictions for the automation equipment except for the film removal tool where able to be obtained through literature and interviews with experts in the industry. Due to the lack of available literature information fitting this specific application, on the protective film removal process, a large proportion of this project was dedicated to the development of this tool. In contrast to previous developments, this project uses shock cooling as a solution to detach the protective film from the prepreg.
Implementation of a P&P cell concept was further investigated by the ability of the robot to reach all equipment without affecting the work flow throughout the Rondal workshop. Regulations and other layout restrictions have been considered for the final layout proposal. In order to align the manual and the automation process effectively, common mechanized process steps have been integrated for the use of both approaches.
The effectiveness of the chosen automation system was demonstrated by analysing cost and time statistics of the on-site process, as well as observations of a computer-assisted process simulation. As a result, lead time saving of up to 5 work days per product type as well as labour time reduction of up to 50% were determined. However, the economic analysis showed that the investment into the P&P automation system is not feasible given the current volume of production. On the basis of these conclusions, recommendations have been made to Rondal, proving potential production changes that could lead to an effective integration of automation at their facilities.

There is a never-ending quest to search for better ways of planning and controlling projects. Currently the majority of all projects are planned with the critical path method and controlled using earned value management. This way of planning and controlling projects has been used for decades now and can be seen as traditional project management (PM). This current PM paradigm does not work well enough for one-off projects. Risk assessment and risk management are not sufficiently covered in most standard PM methods. This thesis looks at the potential of critical chain project management (CCPM) in combination with extensive risk management techniques for improving project performance. The thesis will cover the development of a risk-based critical chain project management (RCCPM) methodology and its application to case studies at a shipyard. The study concludes that RCCPM is a viable alternative for traditional PM in the maritime industry. Improvements include, amongst others, a reduction of the lead-time, more effective monitoring and controlling, and improved dealing with risks and uncertainties.

This thesis contains the model development of a simulation model, to aid the selection of a heavy lift vessel for a North Sea decommissioning project. The model considers fixed steel platforms with maximum topside weight of 1.400 [tons].

European shipyards are building increasing amounts of complex ships such as off-shore, dredging or naval ships that are engineered-to-order. The block division is made when only preliminary hull structural design, functional compartments and the location of major equipment are known. The existing production scheduling optimization algorithms use a single manually created block division as a fixed input. Automatic generation of block division plans can potentially optimize the currently created production planning solutions because all work directly related to the construction of the ship on a shipyard is decomposed by the different chosen blocks.The preliminary design information and general arrangement of the ship, implicit knowledge of engineers and detailed information from comparable reference ships are known. A block division generator is developed to create multiple feasible Block division solutions. The different block division solutions result in deviations to relevant optimization objectives. It is concluded that it is possible to automatically generate block division plans that can be effectively used in ship production optimization algorithm. Due to simplifications in the block division generator and the erection sequence optimization algorithm, no quantitative optimization potential can be determined.

Accurate cost estimations are important for ship production companies such as Royal IHC. The research discussed is based on a feasibility study for a CBR cost estimation method. The current cost estimation method at IHC is a top-down price-to-win analogy cost estimation. This method uses mainly the weight of the ship as an input variable for the estimation. A problem with using only weight is that the actual work performed on a section is left out of the estimation as well as other cost drivers. Another problem occurring is the current estimation method being divided into three phases, with lacking evaluation, optimization and feedback possible. This research discusses two new cost estimation methods. The statistical method is a parametric cost estimation method, that uses equations with the main cost drivers. The graph database method uses the CBR theory as a basis for cost estimations. Problem solving is done by using a solution from an old ship and reusing this solution for a new ship. The graph database stores detailed information about the work performed on the ship and the main cost drivers. The qualitative and quantitative analyses showed that usingmultiple cost drivers and the work performed on a section creates more accurate cost estimations. With a solution as the graph database method also the possibilities of evaluation and process optimizations are broader.

Western shipyards have to distinguish themselves by complex ships with short delivery times. This entails that in most cases the production already starts while the engineering has not even been finished. If the pipes and cables are not routed when the steel plate are cut by the CNC machine, the associated penetrations have to be cut manually during section building, which is very expensive.
The ideal situation is to know the location and size of all penetration before the plates are cut. However, this is not realistic in all cases and therefore a new engineering and production approach is devised. If the penetrations are not known on time, large openings are to be made which can later be filled with inserts, when all exact penetrations are known.
It is possible to just open a lot of large openings, or an estimation concerning optimal openings can be performed. In this research, several algorithms have been created to estimate an optimal opening for a certain penetration, and to check whether this penetration fits in the estimated opening. For the closing of the opening, several methods are described as well. An obvious choice is to close using a welded steel insert plate. A less obvious choice is the rather new product called NOFIRNO®. Both solutions have some advantages and disadvantages for different situations.
All the algorithms are validated by comparing the results to actual built vessels. With the accurateness of this validation, a business case has been performed for several opening methods, combined with several closing methods. The final conclusions and recommendations are not unambiguous for each situation.