Offshore staff
HOUSTON -- ABS has unveiled its ABS Eagle Offshore Structure Assessment Program (OSAP) Version 2.0 at OTC. This latest version allows designers of TLPs and spars to check the compliance of their designs with ABS class requirements. Initially, the software was applicable only to semisubmersibles.
The new software builds on guidance presented in ABS's "Guide for Building and Classing Floating Production Installations" by taking into account the sophisticated load modeling required for these two specialized floating structures.
The various load cases that should be considered include environmental loads, hydrostatic pressures and buoyancy, gravity and inclination-induced loads, inertia loads, operational loads, as well as mooring and riser loads during both transportation and operation and site-specific storm design levels.
The six main functions of the program are load generation, design wave calculation, load mapping and balancing, global strength assessment, fatigue assessment, and buckling and ultimate strength analysis.
"The software streamlines the complex design code check process by helping designers determine environmental loads, transfer hydrodynamic loads to a structural model and extract structural analysis results from a user selected finite element analysis program," explains Pao-Lin Tan, director, ABS Corporate Offshore Engineering Support. "Simply put, the software acts like a data processing hub connecting the hydrodynamic and structural analysis software with analysis results to check against the design code."
05/05/2009
