Everyone knows that
Japanese and Korean cars are popular on American and European roads. Not
many would know how these cars are transported from the place of manufacture
to the dealer, who is located several oceans away. These machines are
usually transported by sea on giant 'Car Carrier' ships.
Motor vehicles as ocean cargo have a number of unique characteristics.
One is the large space they occupy per unit weight. Another is that they
can move around by their own power. These features call for greater capacity
in cubic measures in car carriers relative to their displacements and
obliges them to use the roll-on/roll-off cargo handling system. Furthermore,
the high speed they usually require influences their hull designs.
Loading as many automobiles as practicable means rational arrangement
of many decks, and the arrangement of rampways has very important bearings
on cargo handling efficiency. Thus many modern car carriers have liftable
decks to take on efficiently vehicles of different sizes, and have many
car ports and well arranged rampways so that 500 or even more vehicles
can be loaded per hour. And to improve their load factors, some car carriers
have overhead cranes to carry containers as well.
Capt. Lalit Manaktala gets you an insight on 'Carriers' used to transport
cars by sea.
Car Carriers
 Car carriers come in several sizes. The newer
ones in service now can carry 5000 - 6000 cars. These ships are sometimes
restricted in the ports they can touch. The smaller ships are more flexible
in the sense that they can go to smaller ports. Feeder ships are even
smaller and can carry cars to even smaller places, which may sometimes
be up a tiny river.
The larger ships are sometimes chartered by the large carmakers. They
then carry cars exclusively for themselves. More often though, it is the
large ship owners who hire or operate the ships. Then they carry cars
for any car manufacturer.
 I
was once a master on a car carrier operated by one of the largest Japanese
ship owners. It could accommodate 3500 standard cars. We would load cars
in Japan and discharge them in Central America and the Caribbean. Life
was very hectic on this ship. The loading end was not too bad. We would
load in about 4-5 ports in Japan but at the other end we would have to
touch almost 30 ports in as many days.
This particular ship owner was providing a "service" to the area and even
entering ports for 4-5 cars or just a few packages of spare parts. This
meant that with the high port dues and pilotage and towing charges, the
ship owner was probably not even making a profit. He was just maintaining
a presence in the market hoping for future profits. The only thing was
that this made things very difficult for the ship's crew. Entering and
leaving a port calls for intensive work on our part and doing this every
day meant that we could not, at times, catch up with normal maintenance
work.
 The return journey was easier as there weren't the same
number of cars moving the other way (we would load a few American cars
for the Japanese market). It was on the big ocean crossing that we would
get a chance to do some maintenance and also some well needed R & R in
the form of barbecue parties on Saturday evenings.
During the week we trained the crew in how to lash the cars securely.
Rough weather is normal on the ocean crossing and even one car moving
means scratches or even worse, dents on some new cars. So securing the
cars against movement was an important part of the work for the crew.
At the same time crew are instructed in how to move around the car decks
(there were 12 of these) without so much as touching the paintwork on
a single car. So much so that wearing wrist watches is not allowed because
of the risk of scratching a car while moving around. They are, after all,
stowed within inches of each other so as to maximize the number of cars
carried.
One of the most important pieces of equipment on a car carrier is the
"ramp". This is the large, hydraulically operated, hinged platform that
is lowered for the ingress and egress of the vehicles. While in port it
rests on the quay but at sea it has to be raised, stowed and secured in
such a way as to be completely watertight. The inherent design of a car
carrier with its long stowage compartments makes it especially susceptible
to capsizing should water ingress occur. Ensuring that it is fully and
properly shut before departure and maintaining this state throughout the
voyage is vital.
Another interesting detail of the construction of a car carrier is the
"movable decks". This feature allows certain decks to be raised in order
to enable the carriage of vehicles of different heights. This meant that
we could carry not only ordinary cars but also four wheel drive vehicles,
vans, buses, trucks and even 40 foot container trailers.
Carrying such a variety of vehicles calls for extensive planning. Not
only with regard to the port rotation but also keeping in mind the stability
of the ship. Stowing too many vehicles high up in the ship can lead to
the vessel ending up "top heavy". Careful calculations are therefore called
for to prevent this dangerous event from occurring.
All in all, carrying cars on ships is a specialized job needing especially
designed ships with a well trained and experienced crew. I was lucky to
have just such a crew and my entire tenure of nine months on this ship
went by without a single car being damaged except for one bus which turned
out to be too high for the side opening in the ship and therefore had
its roof slightly flattened as it entered. A successful tenure, all said
and done.
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