Safinah Ltd, a leading marine coatings consultancy, is pleased to announce the initiation of their latest research programme. This research will be carried out in collaboration with Newcastle University School of Marine Science and Technology, American Bureau of Shipping (ABS), a world leading classification society, IHC Merwede Offshore & Marine, an innovative and specialist shipbuilder in the Netherlands, Jotun Paints of Norway, one of the marine paint majors and Muehlhan International of Germany, one of the world’s best known marine painting contractors.

The purpose of the research is to improve the safety of ships by looking at new ways in which structural design can be improved to gain the optimum benefit of modern coating materials, surface preparation and application technology.

The IMO SOLAS regulation MSC.215(82), more widely known as the Performance Standard for Protective Coating ( PSPC ) in dedicated seawater ballast tanks, is now in the process of enforcement by Classification on a worldwide basis. Dr Raouf Kattan, Managing Director of Safinah Ltd, said that “I believe the IMO regulation has highlighted a shortage in the market place of engineering knowledge and thought leadership on issues relating to improving the coating process to meet the challenges posed”. The team at Safinah has already responded actively to clients in need of services with regard to the management of processes required to meet the regulations. However we see opportunities to assist clients further by developing new design guidelines, which will enable them to reduce costs and improve the long term performance of coatings applied in water ballast tanks. In our opinion, this may lead towards more efficient design of the internal structure of ballast tanks, improved build methods surface preparation and new coating process solutions. This could in turn help shipbuilders benefit from increasing productivity and further automation of coating related activities “.

This research will allow Safinah, and their project partners, to explore what can be achieved by altering the approach to structural design and how much it can be optimised for coating activities, without having to compromise either shipbuilding or operational requirements.

The project will be undertaken within the framework of a Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP) programme over a period of 3 years, and with an agreed funding of £200,000. This funding is provided by AEA PLC acting on behalf of the Technology Strategy Board.

In terms of anticipated future input to the marine coatings industry, which will hopefully result from this research, this initiative can be neatly summarised as

“Design for Improving Structural Protection” or DISPRO