Back to drydock?

So if she is delivered to Royal on 27th then she has only 2 days to get to Southampton.

Another sea test for those engines.

Another sea test for those engines.

Hamburg to Southampton is 46 hours at 11 knots.

34 hours at 15 knots, so still not a real power run.

28 hours at 18 knots, and 23 hours at full power.

RCI will have been doing clean up, crew training and particularly training the wait staff in the new restaurants (new station locations, etc) since the 13-14th, so this should be ahead of or at least on schedule.

If steamboats is accurate with the evening undocking on the 25th, and a scheduled arrival in Southampton "PM" on the 30th, I would postulate a night transit to somewhere near the mouth of the river, spend the night bunkering (partial), go out the morning of the 26th for sea trials, most likely only 6-12 hours (since they will only need to do those tests that failed before, or were not able to be done due to the thrusters), come back to Bremerhaven or thereabouts to disembark the yard workers and do the legal paper signing and handover(early), and start for Southampton around midnight the 26/27th or finish bunkering there. I really think they could be underway no later than midnight on the 27/28th, do a 15 knot run, and arrive Southampton around noon. Tides, etc, can affect both the departure and arrival times.

Another sea test for those engines.

Hamburg to Southampton is 46 hours at 11 knots.

 

 

 

34 hours at 15 knots, so still not a real power run.

 

 

 

28 hours at 18 knots, and 23 hours at full power.

 

 

 

Maybe they'll do some more of those big circles and oblongs?

Hamburg to Southampton is 46 hours at 11 knots.

 

34 hours at 15 knots, so still not a real power run.

 

28 hours at 18 knots, and 23 hours at full power.

 

RCI will have been doing clean up, crew training and particularly training the wait staff in the new restaurants (new station locations, etc) since the 13-14th, so this should be ahead of or at least on schedule.

 

Since this is the first passenger cruise on 11/2, will lading take longer than normal? I mean, I am guessing until Royal takes possession, there will be nothing on board. Toiletries, alcohol, all of the food, even all the dry goods, etc.

I am guessing that this will take longer than a normal weekly load of new provisions plus some replacements

Since this is the first passenger cruise on 11/2, will lading take longer than normal? I mean, I am guessing until Royal takes possession, there will be nothing on board. Toiletries, alcohol, all of the food, even all the dry goods, etc.

 

I am guessing that this will take longer than a normal weekly load of new provisions plus some replacements

Even though RC doesn't own the Quantum yet, surely there's plenty of RC crew and property on board already?

Since this is the first passenger cruise on 11/2, will lading take longer than normal? I mean, I am guessing until Royal takes possession, there will be nothing on board. Toiletries, alcohol, all of the food, even all the dry goods, etc.

I am guessing that this will take longer than a normal weekly load of new provisions plus some replacements

Here you get into the sticky areas of new ship building. Generally, the shipyard will restrict access to owner's personnel until near delivery, just to keep them out of the way of the yard workers, and to prevent accidental damage that the yard would have to swallow to repair.

Anyway, my guess would be that RCI was hoping for an early turn over after the original sea trials, and would then spend a few days loading stores and training staff before heading to Southampton. Now that there is the additional dry docking, I believe that RCI and the yard have agreed, since the ship is no longer in Meyer Werft's yard, and the repair work will be done in the technical areas of the ship, that RCI can go ahead and stock the ship while waiting on the B&V dry dock to be available. This will actually let the staff get things organized in the storerooms, so that finding replacement dishes, etc, may be easier than otherwise.

Understand, entering dry dock is nothing close to driving into a garage, this vessel entering dry dock presents vast logistical problems not least the preparation involved due to its size.

Dry dock procedures for a vessel of this size will take five days at a minimum, best be prepared for a cancellation of its TA & perhaps beyond.

Judging by RCI performance to date on this venture, we're unlikely to know until we're due to embark.

Understand, entering dry dock is nothing close to driving into a garage, this vessel entering dry dock presents vast logistical problems not least the preparation involved due to its size.

 

Dry dock procedures for a vessel of this size will take five days at a minimum, best be prepared for a cancellation of its TA & perhaps beyond.

 

Judging by RCI performance to date on this venture, we're unlikely to know until we're due to embark.

"5 days at minimum?" Where are you getting this information or are you simply speculating? Everything that I've read from MW states the ship will be delayed by 2 days and delivery will be on the 29th instead of the 27th?

Understand, entering dry dock is nothing close to driving into a garage, this vessel entering dry dock presents vast logistical problems not least the preparation involved due to its size.

 

Dry dock procedures for a vessel of this size will take five days at a minimum, best be prepared for a cancellation of its TA & perhaps beyond.

 

Judging by RCI performance to date on this venture, we're unlikely to know until we're due to embark.

The dry dock is already prepared before the ship even arrives, as well as all the technical personal standing by to accomplish the tasks needed. The ship is positioned over the blocks, the dry dock is drained, and work commences. It's not as complicated a task as you make it out to be. Once the work is completed the process is reversed.

I don't anticipate anything being canceled at this point. If everything goes as planned QUANTUM will arrive in Southampton for pre-inaugural short cruise and leave on the crossing on time. Only if there are complications found once the ship is out of the water, could there be a chance of the ship being delayed in Southampton. Should that happen, the 2-night pre-inaugural cruise would be canceled first, and if need be the crossing could even be shortened to 6 or 7 days if they increased speed. Right now at 8 days there is time built in to take a Southernly route if necessary and slow down if weather gets bad.

Lot's of "ifs" at this point, and no need for anyone to worry about anything being canceled. Based on everything I've read, the reason for the dry dock is is for alignments and tweaks to thrusters and azipods which is not unusual. It's not like an engine needs replacing or something more serious like that.

For now it's business as usual.

Understand, entering dry dock is nothing close to driving into a garage, this vessel entering dry dock presents vast logistical problems not least the preparation involved due to its size.

 

Dry dock procedures for a vessel of this size will take five days at a minimum, best be prepared for a cancellation of its TA & perhaps beyond.

 

Judging by RCI performance to date on this venture, we're unlikely to know until we're due to embark.

Where are you getting the fact that it will take 5 days minimum? While it will take a day minimum to reset the blocks from the previous ship, and then a day to clean the dock after the Quantum, this is not included in the dry dock time. More like 2-3 hours to spot the ship in the dock, 8 hours to pump the dock dry, and 8 hours to flood the dock, that's less than one day, and the thruster repairs (not knowing what they are, but you can renew seals in 24 hours, the most common problem requiring drydocking), so the 2 days steamboats listed is completely doable. I've probably done more dry dockings than everyone else on CC combined.

Quantum's size is not that important. If the dry dock is large enough to take the ship, they have taken ships this size many times before. Just because this is one of the largest cruise ships in the world, it is far from the largest ship around. Remember that GT is a measure of volume not weight, and that a cruise ship is a whole lot of empty space in upper decks, while a VLCC tanker is all about the hull, and will be longer and wider than Quantum for the same tonnage. The dry dock master could set the blocks, dock the Quantum, and refloat her before his morning coffee. Besides, the B&V yard has had from the 13th to the 23rd to prepare.

The Quantum's dry dock was delayed due to the river depth being lower than required. The dry dock should be ready to handle the ship for the original scheduled date (which gave plenty of time to prepare) and has an additional nearly week before Quantum will now show up to use it. So there should be no delay in the dry docking itself unless they find the water level is still too low.

The thing that I would be more concerned about it what the sea trials may include. Depending on what the thruster problems are they may need to just do some slow speed in port type maneuvers, but if they need to do high speed ones they likely will not be setting the ship up until afterwards. The last thing they want to do is have staff setting up the stores and then throw the ship into a sharp turn and ruin it all.

The Quantum's dry dock was delayed due to the river depth being lower than required. The dry dock should be ready to handle the ship for the original scheduled date (which gave plenty of time to prepare) and has an additional nearly week before Quantum will now show up to use it. So there should be no delay in the dry docking itself unless they find the water level is still too low.

 

The thing that I would be more concerned about it what the sea trials may include. Depending on what the thruster problems are they may need to just do some slow speed in port type maneuvers, but if they need to do high speed ones they likely will not be setting the ship up until afterwards. The last thing they want to do is have staff setting up the stores and then throw the ship into a sharp turn and ruin it all.

The thrusters will not be tested at high speed. The thrusters are almost ineffective at much above 5 knots, due to the water flow along the hull past the thruster tunnels, and the turbulence caused by the water flow striking the after end of the tunnel mouths, essentially creating a low pressure zone on the thruster's "intake" side, reducing the force the thruster propeller can impart to the water, hence the force to move the ship. This is why some ships have "doors" that close the tunnels when at sea; improving the water flow efficiency of the hull by reducing drag at the tunnels plus the fact that the thrusters are almost useless at speed.

Even running all four thrusters at full power spinning the ship will not heel the ship significantly. If they were testing the azipods, that would be a different situation, but they would still have used the time to store the vessel, just not placed the breakables out for meal service.

Understand, entering dry dock is nothing close to driving into a garage, this vessel entering dry dock presents vast logistical problems not least the preparation involved due to its size.

 

Dry dock procedures for a vessel of this size will take five days at a minimum, best be prepared for a cancellation of its TA & perhaps beyond.

 

Judging by RCI performance to date on this venture, we're unlikely to know until we're due to embark.

This is just plain wrong. They can fully drydock a ship this size within a few hours. Drain the basin, fix the problem, flood it, and get it back on its way in a 24-48 hour span. This isn't a mom and pop marina...they deal with large ships all the time.

I work at a shipyard.

Since this is the first passenger cruise on 11/2, will lading take longer than normal? I mean, I am guessing until Royal takes possession, there will be nothing on board. Toiletries, alcohol, all of the food, even all the dry goods, etc.

I hope they will have all provisions onboard already otherwise I won´t get any food or drinks on the pre inaugural ;)!

Regarding the chaotic embarkartion the Oasis had in Southampton I might expect some long waits for the arriving passengers.

Dry dock procedures for a vessel of this size will take five days at a minimum, best be prepared for a cancellation of its TA & perhaps beyond.

How do you come up with that number??? It didn´t take the Oasis 5 days to get into dry dock - this is a matter of a couple of hours!!

Liz, I know that the Quantum was assumed to arrive on the 30th. I just wanted to say that the 31st is the day she has to be there (at least I´d like to board her on that day).

steamboats

 

Liz, I know that the Quantum was assumed to arrive on the 30th. I just wanted to say that the 31st is the day she has to be there (at least I´d like to board her on that day).

 

steamboats

She is scheduled to be in Southampton on the 29th October as per the Southampton port schedule -

http://www.southamptonvts.co.uk/Live_Information/Shipping_Movements_and_Cruise_Ship_Schedule/Cruise_Ship_Schedule/

Hope you enjoy the Pre-Inaugural...having been lucky in the past to have been invited to do 3 of them I know they can be hectic but a lot of fun. :D

Hope you enjoy the Pre-Inaugural...having been lucky in the past to have been invited to do 3 of them I know they can be hectic but a lot of fun. :D

Thanks, it´s work and two nights are definitely way too less for this size of ship! So it will be more stress than fun.

steamboats

I hope they will have all provisions onboard already otherwise I won´t get any food or drinks on the pre inaugural ;)!

 

I hope so too:p

That is even more time sensitive to get everything onboard.

When we did our TA last year on the Mariner, it took several extra hours to bring all the extra stuff on board because of the changes they were making for the China market. We didnt get underway until almost 10 PM

Understand, entering dry dock is nothing close to driving into a garage, this vessel entering dry dock presents vast logistical problems not least the preparation involved due to its size.

 

Dry dock procedures for a vessel of this size will take five days at a minimum, best be prepared for a cancellation of its TA & perhaps beyond.

 

Judging by RCI performance to date on this venture, we're unlikely to know until we're due to embark.

Guess we just debunked this, about 48+ hours, crossing the sill to crossing the sill.

Guess we just debunked this, about 48+ hours, crossing the sill to crossing the sill.

Haha, yup. No "five-day minimum".

Of course, maybe they just took her into the dry dock, closed the door, and didn't really pump the dock or set down on the blocks, which would have required "five days minimum" :rolleyes: They just paid a boat load of money to "rent" the dock for 2 days, 'cause they wanted to build the hype around the delivery. :p

Of course, maybe they just took her into the dry dock, closed the door, and didn't really pump the dock or set down on the blocks, which would have required "five days minimum" :rolleyes: They just paid a boat load of money to "rent" the dock for 2 days, 'cause they wanted to build the hype around the delivery. :p

Hahaha, exactly. They were probably on schedule but wanted to see all hell break loose on Cruise Critic.

Marine Traffic is showing the entire vessel track from Hamburg. It appears she started trials around midnight local time.

Last couple of hours, have been slow speed, and there are numerous radical course changes (heading) without veering off track, so I think the thruster trials are underway.

I'm pretty sure it was Freedom. It was documented on the Discovery Channel special. Which is sort of ironic since rumors are circulating that the Quantum build is being filmed by National Geographic for a special...

You're probably right. I look at the ships from the waterline down, not so much topsides, and the triple pod ships all look alike. :D

Yes, it was the Freedom of the Seas.

Understand, entering dry dock is nothing close to driving into a garage, this vessel entering dry dock presents vast logistical problems not least the preparation involved due to its size.

 

Dry dock procedures for a vessel of this size will take five days at a minimum, best be prepared for a cancellation of its TA & perhaps beyond.

 

Judging by RCI performance to date on this venture, we're unlikely to know until we're due to embark.

The way it see it, the five days will be made up of two days for the ship and three days for you to get your facts straight.