Ships are mainly classified into the following types:
- Container Ships
- Bulk Carrier
- Tanker Ships
- Passenger Ships
- Naval Ships
- Offshore Ships
- Special Purpose Ships
An oil tanker, also known as a petroleum tanker, is a ship designed for the bulk transport of oil or its products. There are two basic types of oil tankers: crude tankers and product tankers. Crude tankers move large quantities of unrefined crude oil from its point of extraction to refineries.[1] For example, moving crude oil from oil wells in a producing country to refineries in another country. Product tankers, generally much smaller, are designed to move refined products from refineries to points near consuming markets. For example, moving gasoline from refineries in Europe to consumer markets in Nigeria and other West African nations.
A cargo ship or freighter is a merchant ship that carries cargo, goods, and materials from one port to another. Thousands of cargo carriers ply the world’s seas and oceans each year, handling the bulk of international trade. Cargo ships are usually specially designed for the task, often being equipped with cranes and other mechanisms to load and unload, and come in all sizes. Today, they are almost always built by welded steel, and with some exceptions generally have a life expectancy of 25 to 30 years before being scrapped.
Dredging is a displacement of soil, carried out under water. It serves several different purposes. One of the applications meets the need to maintain minimum depths in canals and harbours by removing mud, sludge, gravel and rocks. Maintenance dredging is now only a basic task, while other fields are growing in demand much faster: creating new land for port and industrial development; trenching, backfilling and protection work for offshore pipelines, coastal outfall pipelines and for cables laid on the sea bed; environmental dredging and clean-up of contaminated sediments; replenishment of beaches and coastlines, not only for coastal protection, but also for recreational uses.
A catamaran is a multi-hulled watercraft featuring two parallel hulls of equal size. It is a geometry-stabilized craft, deriving its stability from its wide beam, rather than from a ballasted keel as with a monohull sailboat. Catamarans were invented by the Austronesian peoples which enabled their expansion to the islands of the Indian and Pacific Oceans.
Catamarans typically have less hull volume, smaller displacement, and shallower draft (draught) than monohulls of comparable length. The two hulls combined also often have a smaller hydrodynamic resistance than comparable monohulls, requiring less propulsive power from either sails or motors. The catamaran’s wider stance on the water can reduce both heeling and wave-induced motion, as compared with a monohull, and can give reduced wakes.
A ferry is a merchant vessel used to carry passengers, and sometimes vehicles and cargo, across a body of water. A passenger ferry with many stops, such as in Venice, Italy, is sometimes called a water bus or water taxi.
Ferries form a part of the public transport systems of many waterside cities and islands, allowing direct transit between points at a capital cost much lower than bridges or tunnels. Ship connections of much larger distances (such as over long distances in water bodies like the Mediterranean Sea) may also be called ferry services, especially if they carry vehicles.
Some motorboats are fitted with inboard engines, others have an outboard motor installed on the rear, containing the internal combustion engine, the gearbox and the propeller in one portable unit. An inboard-outboard contains a hybrid of an inboard and an outboard, where the internal combustion engine is installed inside the boat, and the gearbox and propeller are outside.
There are two configurations of an inboard, V-drive and direct drive. A direct drive has the power plant mounted near the middle of the boat with the propeller shaft straight out the back, where a V-drive has the power plant mounted in the back of the boat facing backwards having the shaft go towards the front of the boat then making a V towards the rear. The V-drive has become increasingly popular due to wakeboarding and wakesurfing.
A yacht is a sail or power vessel used for pleasure, cruising, or racing. There is no standard definition, so the term applies to such vessels that have a cabin with amenities that accommodate overnight use. To be termed a yacht, as opposed to a boat, such a pleasure vessel is likely to be at least 33 feet (10 m) in length and have been judged to have good aesthetic qualities.
