Hi all, as there are many new cadets joining the forum having difficulty here i'm hoping to explain how to drive a ship in a professional manner.
Although i have put my best effort into this topic you must not Use any of this information as navigational use. although it contains information that do with real life me or VSTEP will not be responsible if any indecent has happened due to this -
chapters (these are here just to help you navigate in such a large topic, you can learn them in any order)
Chapter 1 - Speed and navigation
Chapter 2 - You and others
Chapter 1: Speed and Navigation
1. speed:
it important to maintain a good speed AT ALL TIMES. You Should travel at a fast enough speed you are getting to your location without much force effect (to come at a later date... as i need to sort it out if it correct). but also not to fast that you cant do emergency stops or turns. so ideally before you become very serious with the game why don't you take different types of boats in the Atlantic during calm weather. if you do the sea cats and get them to reach 40 Knots and try to stop it you notice it takes a long time to stop. so try to aim for some sensible speed that you can stop at in an emergency or make everybody sea sick :doh:. You should maintain a appropriate speed at all times, so if your in a harbour doing tight in manoeuvres Maintain a s top speed of no more than 4 knts. When out at sea make sure that you only go up-to your service speed, So don't punch the throttles, as that will make the engineer's cry. Instead keep the throttles at around 80-90% for a large vessel, and around 95% for a small vessel. Because your not using full power, you have some power to manoeuvre when in a emergency. Also, because your maintaining a slower speed, your stopping distance is reduced.
When in a emergency situation when stopping is necessary, throw all engines into flank astern, and if possible, steer hard to port/stbd, this turning movement will help slow your vessel down even more.
to go at a steady speed remember
Also Go at a safe speed. Also dont give your load too much stress. If on a Sea Cat you are more likely to make people ill and this isnt a great thing for the cleaners. On a large cargo ship, by going fast you can also stress the ship. Ships can snap because of this
Thin -tide (don't worry in ship sim)
Matches -Maneuverability ( how much can you move)
Break - background light (can you see the flashing buoys at night?)
When -weather (will it effect anything)
Dropped - depth of you and the sea.
Lights at sea. I will add more if necessary.
Masthead light = white light showing an unbroken light over an arc of horizon of 225 degrees.
Sidelights = Red or green lights showing an unbroken light over an arc of horizon of 112,5 degrees from right ahead to abaft the beam.
Stern light = white light showing an unbroken light over an arc of horizon of 135 degrees.
Towing light = yellow light with the same characteristics as the stern light.
All round light = Red, green, white or yellow light showing an unbroken light over an arc of horizon of 360 degrees.
Power driven vessel with a length under 50 metres. 2nd mast headlight is additional.
Power driven vessel with a length over 50 metres. 2nd mast headlight is mandatory.
Pilot vessel. Easy to remember; white hat, red nose. Back in the days the pilot often arrived on board in
his uniform (white hat) and drunk (red nose).
Sailing vessel (under sail, when they use their engine it becomes a power driven vessel). Red-green light is recommanded, but not mandatory. Mast headlight is not required.
Vessel with restricted manoevrability due draft, for example a VLCC or a bulk carrier.
Vessel with restricted manoevrabilty due the nature of their job, for example a tugboat with a tow or a dredger.
Vessel not under command. Often showen when a vessel cant alter course because of waves / swell. The not under command (NOC) lights can also be showen when a vessel has lost her propulsion or steering gear. When a vessel is aground the NOC lights should be showen in combination with the anchor lights.
Tugboat with a tow longer than 200 metres. Tow is measured from the stern of the tug to the stern of the towed vessel or object. 2nd mast headlight should be showen if the tugboat is longer than 50 metres. The tugboat can also show the 'restricted manoevrability' lights, red-white-red. The yellow light above the stern light is showen, so overtaking vessels can see she's towing. This to prevent from vessel sailing over the tow wire.
Tugboat with a tow under 200 metres. 2nd mast headlight should be showen if the tugboat is longer than 50 metres. The tugboat can also show the 'restricted manoevrability' lights, red-white-red.
Fishing vessel, purse seiner, with a length of the gear under 150 metres. When the gear is longer than 150 metres, a white all round light should be placed.
Fishing vessel, trawler. If the vessel is longer than 50 metres, a headlight should be showen.
Hovercraft. Normal navigation lights of a power driven vessel and an extra yellow flashing light (120 flashes per minute)
Vessel carrying dangerous cargo or involved in bunker operations.
Report to moderator Logged
It's the crew that makes the difference.
Re: Collision regulations
« Reply #1 on: 04 September 2010, 18:52:15 »
Maneuvering Signals• Sailing vessel.
• Fishing vessel (engaged in fishing, so not when she’s sailing from and towards the fishing grounds!)
• Vessel with restricted maneuverability.
• Vessel not under command.
For example; this means that a Vermaas should give way to a fishing vessel, but a fishing vessel gives way to the Sherpa towing a rig with restricted maneuverability or a laden Latitude sailing in a narrow fairway.
Rule 19 - Conduct of vessels in restricted visibility – Every vessel shall proceed with a safe speed (rule 6). A vessel which detects by radar alone the presence of another vessel shall determine if a close-quarters situation is developing and/or risk of collision exists. If so, she shall take avoiding action in the early stages. This means that rule 15 – crossing situation isn’t applicable here, during restricted visibility both vessels shall take actions to avoid collision.
IALA buoyage system.
At sea are 2 types of buoyage systems known, IALA A and IALA B. IALA B is used in America, Japan and the Philippines, IALA A is used in the rest of the world.
The only difference between IALA A and IALA B are the lateral buoys. At IALA A you have the red buoys on your portside, at IALA B you have the red buoys on your starboard side when you are following the buoy direction. The buoy direction is from sea towards the harbor, at sea the buoy direction is shown by a symbol in the chart.
Chart symbol that indicates the direction of the buoys
There are 5 types of navigation buoys:
• Lateral buoys. Red or green, they indicate the border of the fairway and indicates the direction
•Cardinal buoys. Yellow and black, they indicate the safe side of the danger (e.g a wreck or a sandbank). Looks pretty hard to remember, but actually it's pretty easy if you look at the top marks. The north buoy and south buoy point towards the north and south (obvious), the top mark of a West Carinal has the shape of a wineglass. When you know the other 3 the 4th, the east buoy, is easy.
• Isolated danger. Black and red, they indicate the position of isolated danger, contrary to cardinal buoys which indicate a direction away from the danger.
• Safe water. Red and white, indicates safe water. Also known as a mid fairway buoy.
• Special buoys. Yellow, indicates pipelines, special areas etc. etc.
all info Copyright 2010 ballast
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Cores made good.
cores made good is when you plan out your rout before going at sea. you may be asking how, why dont you use these charts:
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150246692288661.331713.189789543660
what you should do is say your going from harbor A and a point and with a pen sill make the course that you can follow. take in the weather, your ships draft's (how deep the ship is), weather any variables. also you should look at the weather (not a problem in ship sim) so you can calculate how long it take you to get there safely (see section Speed)
During the driving in ship sim all other vessels are AI (Artificial intelligent, in a way they do what they want) and athought they try not to hit you they do, so keep an eye out for them as that may be the ship that sinks you.
while out you should look out for:
Ships
Rocks
bouys -
swimmers.
in fact almost everything.
you MUST KEEP AN EYE OUT AT ALL TIME. YOU AND YOUR CREW (bit hard in ship sim)
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Chapter 2: You and Others
here im going to speak about you and others at sea. Some of this you will need muilty player to do.
1. Keeping in contact
it is important to keep in contact with everyone at sea. any Microsoft Flight/simulator gamers will know that you have to speak to the ground all the time. its completely different with ships. you have to keep in contact with other ships and the coast guard. in real life to do this you need to be on a set channel what everyone uses ( i think its channel 16). in ship sim single player you don't need to but in multiplayer you need to Speak to everyone to know what there doing. in an environment there is usually an channel to do small talk on
this can all be done in the chat. You need to know if anybody is will be going in your way and you need to correct it. also smaller boats should give way to bigger boats as its a genital rule. although its not that important you may as well know about it. For more advance PC's and a group of friends playing shipsim, i recommend that you use a service like Skype running in the background so you can hear what your friends are doing.
If you are having issues with other Users on Multi player, please contact Mad_Fred
not me
Thanks
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Glossary:
Port: Left
Starboard: Right
SS : Ship simulator
SSE : Ship Simulator Extremes
Knots = technical Term for nautical miles per hour. I will get to this again.
If you find any problem can you post it here please :)
Ver: 2.3 - most Recent of 9 February 2014
whats new in this issue:
Spellings improve
details added