River Sea-going
The strong point of sea-river shipping is found in its unique market range. Seaport transhipment is not required for sea-river vessels to be able to connect the hinterland with overseas destinations. This results in lower transport costs and a reduced risk of damage on account of the absence of additional transhipment. Maprom equipped dozens of river sea-going vessels with a waterlubricated propeller shaft system.
We started in Russia on a series of ten 5,000 dwt river sea-going dry cargo vessels. Keel-laying for the first vessel took place in St Petersburg in January 2002. St Apostel Andrey was headed the Valday-type of ships was delivered with a Maprom waterlubricated sterntube system early 2002. We carried out much of the propulsion system design work for the newbuilding project in conjunction with the design bureau. Notably, the vessels had river/sea draughts of 3.6m/4.2m to allow cargo to be transported from virtually all river ports in Russia to any European ports.
The “fastest” modern product tanker on the Volga
In 2015 the owner of the MUKHALATKA expressed his satisfaction about the success his company was experiencing with the positive operational result with Project 52 2x1100kW and Maprom designed and supplied propeller shaft installation with Fixed Pitch Propeller and steerable Dutch Designed high thrust rudder nozzle and sailing under RRR Rules.
According to the satisfied owner, the fuel consumption for his vessel on average is only 279 Kg @ 850 RPM and 10,5 Knots (sailing in shallow to average sea depth) and transporting in access of 5000DWT at 3,6 meter waterline. Far less compared to almost identical ship with steerable thrusters.
The maximum sailing speed of the vessel was 12,5 knots in maximum ballast condition and thus the Mukhalatka could be considered as the fastest product tanker on the Volga!