Page 45: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (March 2011)

• Gulf Copper Opens New Galveston Fabrication Facility

Gulf Copper enhanced its global fabrication capabilities with the opening of a new facility at its Galve- ston, Texas location. The $4.35m, 14,000 sq. ft. expansion project was made possible through collab- orative funding from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. “Gulf Copper’s Galveston location features one of the largest dry docks on the U.S. Gulf Coast,” said

Jonathan Hale, Gulf Copper Vice President. “Our Galveston fabrication facility sustained serious dam- age in 2008 from Hurricane Ike. The opening of the new fabrication facility greatly enhances our abil- ity to provide complete repair, conversion, maintenance and emergency services for offshore rigs and marine vessels, plus a wide range of fabricated products.” Gulf Copper has provided fabrication services since 1948. The new Galveston facility includes state-of-the-art plate rolling, cutting and welding systems for fabricating high-pressure vessels and piping, along with critical structural steel weldments. From TLP tendon hang-off structures to BOP support frames, suction piles, PLEMs and

PLETs, Gulf Copper is now fully equipped to offer a complete range of fabricated products. • MAN PrimeServ Engine Management Contract

Nakilat’s wholly owned fleet of LNG ships is now covered by MAN PrimeServ, MAN Diesel &

Turbo’s after-sales division, after an EMC maintenance agreement signed with STASCO – the ship- ping division of Royal Dutch Shell – which manages the Nakilat ships. The contract covers a period of 10 years. The agreement covers maintenance management/planning, assistance from PrimeServ su- perintendent engineers and fitters, as well as spare-parts for 25 LNG carriers (14 Q-Max and 11 Q-

Flex). Each LNG carrier is equipped with two type MAN B&W 7S70ME-C or 6S70ME-C main-engines, and four type 9L32/40 or 8L32/40 auxiliary engines, and turbochargers. The engines power a new fleet of LNG carriers delivered to Nakilat between October 2008 and August 2010.

For the purposes of the EMC agreement, the partners have entered an agreement with the Nakilat –

Keppel Offshore & Marine (N-KOM) yard for some of the supporting services, such as the supply of fitters and the handling of specific overhaul tasks. N-KOM is situated in Ras Laffan, Qatar's main site for LNG production and one of the largest LNG export facilities in the world.

The LNG fleet will call regularly to Ras Laffan where MAN PrimeServ, in a joint venture with Qatar

Navigation, is currently in the process of establishing a 6,000-sq.-m. service centre, headed by Ole S.

Jensen, that will serve EMC vessels as well as other ships visiting Qatar. The service centre is located close to N-KOM and will specialise in fuel equipment, turbochargers, governors and all kind of over- hauls as well as retrofits. Essentially, the EMC fixes customers’ maintenance costs at a set level, nor- mally a steady monthly outlay that facilitates the advance setting of budgets with any excessive maintenance costs covered by MAN Diesel & Turbo. • Permanent Insert Repair on Bulk Carrier

Hydrex was contacted to carry out permanent insert repairs on board a bulk carrier that had suffered several cracks in the shell plating of its ballast tanks. In total three new insert plates were installed while the vessel was berthed in Norfolk, Va.

A diver-technician team with equipment was mobilized from the Hydrex office in Clearwater, Fla.

When the team arrived with two locally constructed tailor- made cofferdams, they carried out both an onboard and an underwater inspection of the damaged area. Next they removed the part of the bilge keel covering the damaged areas. After the designated ballast tanks were declared gas free, the team prepared and set up all the equipment for the inside work. The divers positioned the first cofferdam on the in-water side of the hull over the first location. Next the old shell plating was removed and a new insert was installed and secured with full penetration welding. The first cofferdam was then removed and positioned over the second crack while at the same time the second cofferdam was installed over the location of the third and final cracked area. The team then removed the shell plating at both loca- tions and positioned and secured a second and third new insert following the same procedure. • Gibdock Completes Comanav Ferry Special Survey

Gibdock completed work on the ferry Ibn Batouta, for Moroccan operator Comanav. Docked in early

September for a 25-day stay at the Gibraltar ship repair and conversion yard, work included the 130m long RoPax vessel’s sixth special survey.

Built in 1981 by Harland & Wolff for UK operator Sealink, as St Christopher, Ibn Batouta has space for 1,350 passengers as well as 850 lane meters for cars and road haulage vehicles. It is deployed on

Comanav’s regular passenger and car service between Tangiers, Morocco and Algeciras, Spain. In ad- dition to carrying out an extensive package of routine works to get the vessel through the demanding sixth special survey to classification society approval, Gibdock was tasked with undertaking a thorough overhaul of the vessel’s two Pielstick Crossley 16PC 2V MK5 main engines. These 16-cylinder engines were both completely dismantled and all components taken to Gibdock’s specialist onsite workshop for repair and refurbishment before being reinstalled onboard within a very tight time scale. While docked, the yard carried out extensive external hull blasting and painting; withdrew the tailshaft for overhaul; and repaired and refurbished numerous pumps and valves.

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