Where are ships built these days?

Cardinal Richelieu

BBC4 repeated a documentary on the decline of the ship building on the Clyde the other night. Where are ships built these days?

goldie fish

Everywhere but the Clyde.

It depends on what you are building. The Koreans are putting out the majority of the Tonnage these days when it comes to tankers, but the French and italian yards are still pulling their weight when it comes to Large passenger vessels. The Dutch and scandanavian yards seem to have cornered the market on ferries, with the Vikings after carving a particular niche on Offshore Support vessels.

That said the normal arrangement these days is one parent company sharing numerous yards in Europe and North America.
The clyde declined because their methods were outdated. The stereotype image of a new ship sliding down a slipway into the water for the first time stern first is a thing of the past. Most launches these days are either beam on, in the case of smaller vessels(very spectacular splash) or the more common method of the prefab blocks being assembled into a completed ship in a drydock type basin. On launch day, the caisson is removed, the tide comes in, and the ship floats off the drydock floor.
Smaller yards are still doing niche building work, but to survivethey need to be flexibile enough to do whatever heavy engineering projects are available. Almost Every UK yard at present is engaged in constructing some module for the New Aircraft carriers, which will be assembled in Rosyth.

The US shipyards of course are still busy, but most rely on local(and often state subsidised) orders to survive. Their work patterns and methods are quite inefficient, by modern standards, with time and cost overruns the norm, rather than the exception.

Tabnabs

I sailed on two ships made on the Clyde, one built 1992 and the other 2000. Both were pretty pi$$ poor ships, especially when compared to Scandinavian standards.

But, they do still build on the Clyde, Ferguson's are the last one AFAIK.

But Japan, S.Korea and China are the main shipbuilders today.

jhegarty

There is also Meyer Werft in Germany.

They have giant sheds and build large cruise ships inside.

drivealive

Having worked in a Norwegian yard 90% of all newbuilds have the hull built in Poland,Turkey,Ukraine,Romania and even China. They are then towed to Norway and outfitted here.

Tabnabs

Similar to what they did to the ILV Granuaile

The order for the new ship was placed on 7th March 1998 with Damen Shipyards of Holland. The ship's hull was fabricated in Galatz Shipyards in
Romania and launched on 14th August 1999. She was then towed to the Netherlands for final fitting out by Damen Shipyards.

http://www.commissionersofirishlights.com/media/16180/granuaile_information_leaflet.pdf

gobnaitolunacy

There's the Uljanik yard in Pula, Croatia.

http://www.uljanik.hr/

Cardinal Richelieu

gobnaitolunacy wrote: »

There's the Uljanik yard in Pula, Croatia.

http://www.uljanik.hr/

That is actually the only Croatian shipyard that turns a profit. Not looking great for the rest of Croatia shipbuilding now that they have gained EU membership.

http://www.hellenicshippingnews.com/News.aspx?ElementId=c1196bc5-64c2-4048-92e5-5fc2864f8c77

The_Wrecker

I was in Helsinki (Tallink terminal) last October and the building of ships was in full swing with the yards full.