Abstract

The paper introduces an innovative complexity metric for passenger ships taking into account the shape complexity of steel parts, the assembly complexity and the material complexity. The goal is to provide the designer with such information throughout the design process so that an efficient design is obtained at the first design run. Real-time assessment of complexity and quality measurements is rather imperative to ensure efficient and effective optimality search, and to allow real-time adjustment of requirements during the design. Application and validation on a real passenger ship show that the new method is effective in giving a complementary aid to decision process for ship designers. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.