Page 8: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (July 1996)

Washington State Ferry Awards Propulsion Contract To Siemens by Kathleen Gleaves, contributing editor

The Washington State Ferry (WSF) System recently awarded

Siemens Energy and Automation,

Inc. the contract for propulsion control system replacement on three steel electric class ferries.

The 256-ft. (78-m) vessels are part of the largest ferry fleet in the

U.S., which consists of 22 auto fer- ries and three passenger-only ves- sels. The ferry system serves 20 terminals in Puget Sound, Wash., and Sidney, B.C.

The three ships were built in 1927, and completely rebuilt for

WSF between 1985 and 1987. With nine years of propulsion control failure problems on record, the

U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) required that the company choose between a permanent solution or the removal

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Problems have not only ren- dered ships dead in the water, but have also caused damage to docks, as the ships have lost control at crucial moments. Many incidents necessitated removing vessels from service, leaving the already overburdened ferry system short on its busiest runs.

In addition, dock repairs left various terminals out of service for periods ranging from several days to several weeks.

After an initial review of the

Request For Proposal, there were only two competitive bidders left in the competition. While Siemens' bid price of $6,888,138 for the three complete systems was reportedly slightly higher than the other competitors, both bids were well below WSF engineers' esti- mates of approximately $7.5 mil- lion.

The final proposals underwent an intense technical evaluation procedure, which analyzed many different factors, and assigned numerical scores for each. More than half of all possible points went to performance and reliabili- ty factors, where the Siemens' pro- posal scored higher overall.

New Technology Needed

The obsolete analog system on the three WSF ferries has been problem-plagued since its installa- tion. Replacement parts had to be custom-made, and quality control was reportedly low. The analog system settings varied with each of the three boats and were said to be difficult to troubleshoot.

The new digital product from

Siemens is self-monitoring with built-in self-diagnostic capabilities.

That is, internal sub-programs interpret trouble signals and com- ponent failures, and provide that information to the operator.

Additionally, it uses open-stock parts, which are readily available from the manufacturer and third- party suppliers. The entire system has the added advantage of being composed of off-the-shelf compo- nents using industry-proven tech- nology.

By contract, Siemens is required to support the system for 15 years, the projected end of the useful life of the vessels. WSF's long-range plans call for the replacement of these ships with higher-perfor- mance vessels.

The project requires removal and replacement of the propulsion controls and the electric propulsion drives. The new solid state motor drives will be built at the Siemens

Industrial Drive Division in

Alpharetta, Ga. The control con- sole, computerized alarm and mon- itoring system and switchboard control system will be designed and built by Siemens Marine

Systems in Montreal, Quebec. The alarm and monitoring system is

Maritime Reporter/Engineering News