Master Course „Maritime Operations“

„Ship Propulsion Systems“

Lecture 1
Summer Semester 2023

Prof. Dipl.-Ing. Freerk Meyer

University of Applied Sciences Emden-Leer

Ship Propulsion Systems today / yesterday

The historical development of ship propulsion systems
The historical development of ship propulsion systems
Ever since humans started to sail, wind has been used as a natural source of propulsion or relied on
muscle power. The most diverse types of boats and ships developed with which people could trade,
wage wars, travel and make discoveries.

With the beginning of industrialisation (from around 1800) and the rapidly growing population in
Europe, the demand for goods from overseas grew steadily. The colonies in India, China, Africa and
America had to be connected with their "mother countries", military interests had to be protected.

Therefore, seafaring experienced a great upswing with the beginning of modern times. The number of
ships and their size increased rapidly. Sailing ships were continuously optimized and adapted to the
requirements. Nevertheless, the disadvantages of sail propulsion and the limits of their technical
development became increasingly clear.

The tea clippers “Taeping” and “Ariel” 1866 at the finish of their famous race around half the world

In parallel, industrialisation led to the development of new techniques and materials. The development
of the steam engine and the industrial production and use of iron, cast iron and steel changed the
world. Coal became the most important energy source of the beginning modern times.

The development of the steam engine

The first steam engines were already developed in England in 1720. These stationary plants were
mainly used in mining and had a very low efficiency and were still very unreliable.

Around 1770, James Watt improved the existing steam engines to such an extent that they became
usable machines. The double-acting low-pressure steam engines were equipped with a flywheel, speed
control and a connecting rod / crankshaft drive.

These steam engine plants used coal as fuel. Water is evaporated in boilers and pressurized. The steam
is fed into the cylinders of the steam engine where the steam expands and drives the (reciprocating)
piston. This piston is connected by the connecting rod to the crankshaft, which turns the stroke
movement of the piston into a rotary movement.

The steam engines experienced a significant technical development in the 19th century. In addition to
improved production methods and improved materials (especially in bearing and sealing technology),
energy efficiency was significantly increased. From about 1880 onwards, triple expansion steam
engines were used, and the steam pressure was increased by improved steam boilers. This led to a
considerable improvement of the drives in terms of performance, fuel consumption and reliability.
Steam engines as ship propulsion
There have been attempts to equip ships with mechanical propulsion systems for about 230 years. The
aim was to make maritime traffic independent of wind and weather. The steam engines that had been
used stationary until then were to be integrated into ships.

In 1785, the American John Fitch first had the idea of using steam for ship propulsion.

(The steamboat of 1786)

The steamboat "Charlotte Dundas" was in 1802 the first functional boat with a drive line of about 10
hp. The 17 m long boat was equipped with a double-acting J. Watt system and towed 2 barges of 70 t
each on test runs in headwind over the Forth and Clyde Channel in England.

The first ship steam engines brought their energy into the water by means of paddle wheels. In these
machines the shaft of the paddle wheels is designed as a crankshaft.

Subsequently, there were numerous attempts to integrate steam engines into boats and ships. In 1808,
the paddle steamer "Phoenix" was the first steam-driven ship to set sail on the high seas in the USA.
At the same time, the approximately 40 m long "Clermont" with a steam drive successfully sailed on
the Hudson River/USA from 1807.

In 1819 the combined steam and sailing ship "Savannah" crossed the Atlantic for the first time.

Parallel to the rapid development of steam engines, the use of iron and steel as a material for ship
hulls was pushed forward.

For ships made of wood, propulsion with steam engines was a dangerous thing due to the risk of fire
and explosion. Furthermore, the integration of the complex machines with high weight and their
power transmission on wooden ships was difficult to realize.
 (Great Eastern 1857)

With the "Great Eastern", English shipbuilders achieved a technical quantum leap in 1857 after many
difficulties. With a size of 18,915 gross register tons, the ship was 211 m long, 25.3 m wide and 17.7 m
high. The hull was made entirely of steel, the hull was double-walled (distance 0.85 m). The drive was
provided by two lateral paddle wheels and a stern screw; the wheels had a diameter of 17 m, the screw
7.3 m. The propulsion system consisted of two steam engines with together 8300 HP and 10 boilers
and gave the ship a speed of 12.5 kn. The ship was

Drives with lateral paddle wheels could initially be integrated relatively easily into the familiar ship
shapes. For example, no shaft feedthroughs under water are required. The pistons of the steam
engines could also act directly on the paddle wheels, an additional crankshaft was not necessary. The
relatively slow speed of the paddle wheels harmonized with the speed of movement of the single
piston steam engines.

The technical disadvantages of the bucket wheels (size, limited power transmission, low efficiency,
damage in case of sea wash) soon led to the development of the first propeller drives. In 1826, the
forester Josepf Ressel invented the ship's propeller, which became established as a ship's drive within
the next 50 years.

1845 there is a tug-of-war between the two British frigates "Rattler" (with screw drive) and the
"Alecto" (paddle wheel drive). The screw drive wins convincingly.

In the course of the history of development, the propellers have been continuously improved and
adapted to the increasing requirements of ship designs (ship size, speed, performance). As a result,
bucket wheel drives were gradually displaced in maritime shipping. On shallow rivers or lakes,
however, bucket wheel drives can still be used sensibly today.

Steam turbine drives

From about 1900 onwards, steam piston engines became the competition. The first usable steam
turbines were developed by the Swede Carl Gustav Patrik de Laval in 1883 and the Englishman Charles
Parsons (1884)). Parsons was also the first to install a steam turbine in a ship, the "Turbinia".

The turbine, patented in 1884, is technically distinguished by the fact that it was the first steam turbine
to operate as a reaction turbine and had several stages with axial flow consisting of guide and rotor
blades.
The experiment was a complete success: the Turbinia immediately became the fastest ship in the world
by some distance, thus heralding the generational change in ship propulsion from steam engine to
turbine.

In 1905, the Admiralty decreed that all warships built for the Royal Navy in the future should be
equipped with turbine propulsion. In 1906, the Navy's first turbine-powered battleship, the
revolutionary HMS "Dreadnought", was put into service. The first civilian ship with turbine propulsion
was the passenger ship "King Edward".

Today, steam turbines are mainly used in stationary power plants. However, they are still used as
the main propulsion units of ships, e.g. in the aircraft carriers of the US Navy. Nuclear reactors
generate the necessary steam.

In the 1950s and 1960s there were attempts to equip merchant ships with nuclear reactors. One
example is the German "Otto Hahn":

Oil replaces coal as fuel for ships

In the 1920s, steam was increasingly generated using oil-fired boilers. The fuel oil completely replaced
coal in a short time. Although oil was considerably more expensive than coal, it was much easier to
handle and significantly reduced the number of crews needed on the ships.
Internal combustion engines
In steam engine plants (piston or turbine), the steam is generated in an external combustion chamber
and fed to the actual engine via pipes.

In internal combustion engines, the energy conversion (combustion of the fuel) takes place directly in
the engine (internal combustion).

Almost parallel to the development of the steam turbine described above, the different internal
combustion engines were invented by Nicolaus August Otto (Otto engine 1874) and Rudolf Diesel
(Diesel engine 1897). In addition to these engine types, which are still known today, gas engines and
glow-head engines were developed and used.

In the long term, only the diesel engine has established itself in shipbuilding. This, however, with
overwhelming success. Today more than 97 % of all seagoing vessels have a diesel engine drive. Today,
gasoline engines are only used in the construction of pleasure boats and for outboard engines.

Diesel engines
At the end of the 19th century, Rudolf Diesel had developed a new type of internal combustion engine.
In principle, these units were to have a significantly higher efficiency than the well-known steam
engines, whose overall efficiency was around 20%.

In close cooperation with Maschinenfabrik Augsburg (today MAN), Diesel developed an engine that
uses compression to heat air in a combustion chamber in such a way that injected fuel ignites and
drives a piston downwards. He began demonstrating the new engine in Augsburg on 1 February 1897.
The efficiency of the engine was already over 25 % in the first, successful tests.

It took several years until the diesel engine was mature enough to be used economically and reliably.
Parallel two-stroke and four-stroke engines were developed.

Diesel engine variants

Four-stroke engines
A four-stroke engine is a combustion engine that requires four strokes for the cycle. In a reciprocating
piston engine, one cycle is the movement of the piston from standstill in one direction to standstill
again. The crankshaft therefore performs half a revolution during one cycle. The strokes: 1. intake, 2.
compression, 3. work, 4. exhaust, i.e. combustion takes place per cylinder every two revolutions. There
is at least one inlet and one exhaust valve per cylinder. Today, four-stroke engines are used in
shipbuilding as high-speed and medium-speed diesel engines (as main engines for small and medium-
sized ships or as power generators). The engines are designed as in-line and V-engines (with up to 20
cylinders).

Two-stroke engines
In one, fresh air is blown in through inlet slots in the lower part of the liner. The exhaust gases are
discharged via exhaust valves on the cylinder head. To force the combustion chamber gases into the
exhaust tract, a higher pressure of fresh air is required.
 (Modern large 2 stroke engine combustion chamber)

The fresh air used to be blown in with mechanical turbochargers, today exhaust gas turbochargers are
used.

There is one combustion per cylinder with each revolution of the engine. Today, large two-stroke diesel
engines are considered the most efficient thermal engines in general. Due to a large displacement and
speeds of around 100 rpm, a lot of time is available for changing the charge, which makes it possible
to burn a larger amount of fuel. Ship diesel engines achieve an effective efficiency of over 50 %.

Diesel engines with or without crosshead

The crosshead is a coupling link on large piston machines between the linearly moving piston rod and
the pivoting connecting rod. An example of application is the crosshead in two-stroke marine diesel
engines.

Due to the rigid piston rod, the upper pivot point of the connecting rod (in the crosshead) is displaced
towards the crankshaft. This prevents the connecting rod from colliding with the cylinder liner. Four-
stroke diesel engines today are generally designed without crosshead.

Use of diesel engines on ships

The first diesel-powered motor vessel was the small Russian tanker "Vandal" in 1903 on the Caspian
Sea.
In 1912 the Motor Vessel "Selandia" was the first seagoing motor cargo ship. It was equipped with 2
8-cylinder four-stroke diesel engines from B+W with 2500 kW for approx. 11kn speed. The propulsion
worked very reliably for many years.

The First World War with its great demand for effective, compact engines (e.g. for submarines and
speedboats) accelerated the development of these engines.

After the First World War the development of diesel engines continued. Important aspects were the
significantly higher efficiency of the engines compared to steam-powered plants, a much more
compact design and lower manpower requirements.

A decisive step towards improving diesel engines was the invention of supercharging the combustion
air by using exhaust gas energy (pressure wave process, 1925) and the progressive improvement of
injection technologies. Today, diesel engines are fitted with exhaust gas turbochargers as standard and
are currently the most effective energy generators on ships, their efficiency is around 50%.

2-stroke crosshead diesel as main drive 4-stroke diesel engine for power generation
Electric drives
The first electric ship drives were based on pure accumulator drives and were used for passenger
transport on rivers and lakes. At first, there were no applications in maritime traffic.

In 1883 Werner von Siemens built the experimental boat "Elektra"

At the beginning of the 20th century, electric drives were decisively further developed for submarines.

Petroleum gas engines and diesel engines were used as generator sets to produce electrical power
that could be stored in large accumulators and used for propulsion during underwater travel. These
propulsion systems are direct current systems.

The first large German ship with an electric propeller system was the "Potsdam" in 1935

The Potsdam had two three-phase drive motors, the electricity was generated by steam turbine
generators.

Electric drives are increasingly used in passenger shipbuilding in particular. Good control behavior of
the drives, low noise development and good consumption values led to this.

This trend was reinforced by the development of “pod- drives” / Azipod -Drives (in use since the 1990s).

Gas Turbines
Gas turbines are valued as marine propulsion systems primarily because of their high power density
(ratio of power to space requirements). They are therefore used primarily where high power is
required in a very confined space, where high speeds are driven and where the relatively high
investment costs of the gas turbine are less significant, for example in the military sector. In the case
of more spacious ships and in civil shipping, a diesel engine that is less expensive to buy is usually
preferred for economic reasons.

Gas turbines basically consist of an air intake, a compressor, a combustion chamber, a turbine and a
nozzle for jet engines or a diffuser and an output shaft for shaft drives.
Gas turbines were developed for jet aircraft during the Second World War. After a long development
period, a gas turbine was first installed in a ship, a speedboat of the British Navy, in 1947. In merchant
shipping, the first gas turbine was installed on the British tanker "Auris" in 1951.

Historic Gas turbine with attached reduction and reversing gear

Today, gas turbines are often used in combination with other propulsion engines for fast ships. The
base load of the propulsion system is then covered by diesel engines while the turbines cover power
peaks. The turbine can act on the propeller via gears or be used as a generator set for electric drives.

Alternatives to the classic shaft system

Schottel- Rudderpropeller- Propulsion Systems
The development and construction of the Schottel Rudderpropeller (SRP) in 1950 represented a
milestone in steering technology, as the 360° swivel drive beam meant that from then on it was
possible to dispense with a rudder blade. This new type of steering system increased the
manoeuvrability of the ships. Over the next ten years, the new propulsion technology also gained
acceptance for large ship units, and so the first harbour tug with Schottel propulsion took up service
in 1967.

Motor

Even today these propulsion systems are mainly used on tugs and for special vessels with high
manoeuvrability.
Voith - Schneider Drive
The Voith Schneider Propeller (VSP) is a marine propulsion system in which the thrust can be adjusted
in size and direction without changing the speed. It is controlled by setting the pitch for the direction
ahead - back (cruising) and by setting it transverse to the ship (rudder). This type of steering gives the
vessel maximum manoeuvrability and allows very fine dosage of thrust and extremely fast change of
thrust direction without changing the speed. If the vessel is equipped with two or more VSPs, the vessel
can move in any direction, even sideways (traversing).

The Voith-Schneider drive was invented by Ernst Schneider. It has been developed and produced by
the Voith company in Heidenheim and St. Pölten since 1926.

Due to its excellent controllability, the Voith-Schneider drive is used in towed vehicles, double-ended
ferries, passenger ships, buoy layers, floating cranes, oil rig supply vessels, etc.

Tug "Stier" in the Bremerhaven Maritime Museum

POD drives /Azipod drives

The POD drive (brand name of Wärtsilä) is a powerful electric drive motor mounted outboard in a
nacelle. Often the propeller is arranged pulling, so it works in trouble-free water. The drive can be
rigid or rotating (=> designation: "Azipod" (brand name of the company ABB)).
The principle of the podded drive was invented as early as 1955 by the Pleuger company in Hamburg.

They were developed by ABB from about 1980 onwards. The Kvaerner shipyard in Finland was the
first to equip an icebreaker with pod drives in 1994. Shortly later the first cruise ship with POD's was
designed and built.

Meanwhile many cruise ships are equipped with POD drives. Example: The "Radiance oft the Seas"
delivered by Meyer Werft in 2001 with two Azipod drives.

The weak points of the PODs are the radial bearings, which are subject to wear due to constant small
rudder movements.

Waterjet propulsion / Waterjets

A functioning water jet propulsion system was first presented in 1954. Today, it is mainly used in fast
ships and boats. There are systems with a drive power of up to 26 MW.

Compared to classic ships with propeller drive, jet propelled vehicles can be built extremely flat and
are extremely manoeuvrable even at low speeds.

Cavitation only occurs at much higher flow velocities than with an open propeller, as the pressure
conditions during operation at the blade of an impeller in jet propulsion correspond to those of a
pump.

The catamaran "Nordlicht" of the AG Ems, Emden.

Propulsion: 2 MTU diesel engines with water jet propulsion. Vmax: 38 kn.
Ships with combined propulsion systems
The currently most prominent example of a ship with a combined propulsion system consisting of 4
pod - traction propeller units, 4 diesel generators and 2 gas turbine generators is the "Queen Mary 2"
built in 2003:

The "Queen Mary 2" with turboelectric CODAG - Pod drive system

The Queen Mary II, with a total of 172,400 HP installed power for propulsion and hotel operation, is
designed as a special feature for two applications. As a cruise ship with a normal speed of 20 - 24 knots,
the diesel engines (4x Wärtsilä 16V46CR with 22,850 HP each) are sufficient to drive the generators for
propulsion and other power supply for the auxiliary engines and hotel operation.

For the classic transatlantic voyage between Southampton and New York City a higher speed is
required. Then the two General Electric LM2500+ gas turbines, each with 40,500 HP, can supply
additional propulsion power to the four 30,000 HP electric propulsion engines with integrated
propellers in pod design. This will enable a maximum speed of 34 knots to be achieved.

Summary / Outlook
Ships with mechanical drives have been in use for about 200 years. For 60 years (after the tragic
accident of the combined grain freighter and sailing training ship "Pamir") these drives have completely
replaced the sailing ship as a means of transport on the high seas.

The technical developments ("industrialization") in the 19th century led to a multifaceted revolution
in shipbuilding. Ships were no longer built from wood but from iron and steel. At this time, ships with
coal-fired piston steam engines were predominant. While at the beginning of the development ships
were driven by paddle wheels, propeller systems for seagoing vessels soon replaced paddle wheels
(from about 1850).

Modern merchant ships are driven by one or two propellers as propulsion systems. Today, the
continuous development of propeller geometry as well as ship geometry enables efficiencies in the
transfer of energy from the shaft system into the water for propulsion of the ship which are not
achieved by any other propulsion system.

With the beginning of the 20th century, large passenger ships and warships were equipped with steam
turbines instead of the conventional steam engines. Steam turbines remained an important propulsion
system until the 1970s, e.g. for large tankers and fast freighters.

After the First World War, steam boilers were increasingly fired with oil instead of coal.
In parallel with the development of steam turbines, diesel engines became increasingly important for
ships. Today diesel engines have an overwhelming market share of approx. 97 %. These ships are
powered by marine diesel oil or heavy fuel oil.

Marine propulsion systems with gas turbines, which have been available since the 1950s of the 20th
century, are niche solutions for special requirements. The same applies to water jet propulsion for
(smaller) fast ships.

In recent years, systems in which the mechanical energy of the diesel engine is no longer brought into
the water via a shaft system but the diesel drives a generator have gained in importance. The electrical
energy generated in this way is used to drive a propeller with an electric motor (as a shaft system or
e.g. pod drive).

Currently, the fuels used so far and their environmentally influencing emissions are under discussion.
Today's heavy oils with a high sulphur content and exhaust gas compositions that are difficult to control
may no longer be used everywhere. We are therefore on the threshold of considerable further
developments in engine construction and in the development of transport logistics and storage for the
use of alternative fuels such as natural gas (as liquefied LNG) or e.g. hydrogen.

In general, it can be predicted that in the future, individually tailored drive systems with high
efficiencies will be (further) developed and used increasingly for the individual ship types, sizes and
applications.

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