Abstract
A mobile harbor is a floating structure especially designed for loading and unloading containers from and to a large container ship. The purpose of this study is to develop a stacking guidance system (SGS) of containers in the mobile harbor, MH. The guidance system is an aid for loading containers with a wider opening for easier stacking of a container into a moving storage cell due to waves. Thus the system can provide an extra space through the expanded cell-guide. In order to determine the most effective inclination angle of the cell-guide, this study performed the dynamic analysis of the SGS equipped in the MH subject to fluctuations of the sea. The use of the cell-guide could increase the opening by 50% comparing to the case without it. The motions of the guidance system and a container loaded were calculated using ADAMS. The simulation results of the contact force between the two rigid bodies showed that a desirable angle of the cell-guide should be around 20 degrees from the vertical. This proposed SGS can considerably reduce the loading or unloading time, and will enhance the performance of the MH.
