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Home › Naval Architecture

What Are Ship Bottom Plugs Or Dock

Plugs?
By Subhodeep Ghosh | August 19, 2022 | Naval Architecture

A vessel may be drydocked for maintenance or repair from time to time at

particular locations where there is a framework of procedures, including
inspection, assessment, and definitive measures for mitigation of the issue or
having an overview of the fitness of the hull and systems. In the drydocking
process, ship bottom plugs or docking plugs play an intrinsic role. 

Double-bottom hulls often store ballast water, and single-bottom hulls also have
clogged water, oily residues, sludges, or wastewater from various sources. All
these remnant residual water or residues must be completely stripped off during
repair or inspection work. 

Furthermore, bilge tanks or freshwater storage tanks forming a part of the hull
structure must also be completely dry for inspection and repair work. At this point,
it may be argued that these tanks have separate pumps for draining, which is
always done at sea during routine ballasting and de-ballasting operations.
But pumps do not achieve a 100% ideal result. Even after draining water through
upper outlet points, there is always a minimum level of ankle-deep water that
remains at the bottom, which cannot be removed from any other bottom outlets
while at sea. However, this negligible amount of water does not affect the de-
ballasting objective of the vessel and stability requirements as a whole and is thus
ignored for all practical purposes.

But for critical repair or inspection work, there has to be no residue, and the tank
needs to be fully dry and clean. Moreover, during certain drydock repair work, the
ship must be kept ”dead” without machinery working or supplying any external or
internal power source. During such scenarios, even water drainage from the bilge,
ballast, or any water storage tanks cannot be carried out with the help of pumps. 

Similarly, it is the same problem in the case of any bottom oil tanks. Hence, for all
such reasons, a drainage system at the bottom of the hull structure is necessary
for any vessel. 

How do Dock Plugs Work

A ship bottom plug or docking plug is a kind of openable tight stopper
arrangement that covers the opening outlets for water or residual egress in the
bottom parts of the hull structure. The plug has a tightly fitted metal lid that can be
opened and plugged back into the opening outlets when required. 
So, during drydocking operations, the plug is carefully removed, and all water or
clogged liquid residues are allowed to eject at ease. Though ship bottom plug or
docking plug are used interchangeably, docking refers more to the screw-like
stoppers fitted near the lower-bottom garboard strake shell plating at the bottom of
each subdivision or compartment throughout the hull for drainage.

As a part of operations, after the vessel is placed on the repair or examination

blocks after moving into the drydock area, the removal of the plugs is requested.
As a part of common procedural practices, the plugs removed from the hull need
to be labelled accordingly to avoid any mix-up while refitting them back. 

As these screw-like plugs are very tightly fitted and usually penetrate quite deep
inside the shell plating, removal is not an easy task. It requires a very high amount
of human effort. So, they are mostly removed with special apparatus like
wrenches, spanners, levers, or large drivers, which draw them quickly. Like almost
every other mechanical system, rotating in a clockwise sense drives them inwards
and is vice versa for the anti-clockwise sense. 

Most of these plugs are designed like a screw-stopper with the protruding male
part with windy threadings on the circumferential periphery for driving them in and
out of the opening ports. 
This is followed by the flange structure, which forms the outer surface and comes
in contact with the rest of the outer hull. The types of plugs available are usually
circular with inscribed sockets for screwing, those being either hexagonal or
rectangular, and the former being more common. They are generally of stainless
steel or brass, which have superior anti-corrosive and durable properties.

Different Sizes of Dock Plugs

 The plugs’ sizes depend on the nominal dimensions of the opening to which it is
sealed. However, they usually come in standard diameters like 30 mm, 42 mm, 52
mm, 62 mm, 72 mm, and so on. The thickness also varies with the diameter and
can be as low as less than 10 mm, usually for smaller ships with low shell plating
thicknesses, to as high as over 40 mm, usually for larger ships with thicker bottom
shell plating. The plugs are sealed in such a way that they remain oil tight as well
as watertight. 

All bottom plugs or docking plugs must be tested before installation on the hull.
The two early stages of testing are warehouse and production testing to check for
defects, size and fitting inaccuracies, packing, surface deformations, etc. Before
these, water testing takes place to check for water tightness.

Testing Dock Plugs For Leakages

After drydocking operations, the plugs are once again retested to check for any
leakages as they are unwanted. This is done by a particular method: Pressure
Testing or Vacuum Testing. Here, the testing unit has a glass box and a
compressor with a long hose.
 A soapy solution is sprayed inside the plug, and the box unit is placed underneath.
The inside of this box is essentially air-free. Any leakages will be exhibited as
bubbles on the testing unit after some time. In such cases, the gasket is removed
and replaced again. If there is no improvement, it is changed. After passing the
tests, the dry dock is flooded again.

You might also like to read.

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The Ultimate Guide to Fuel Oil Bunkering Process on Ships
Air bottle or Air receiver On board Ship

Disclaimer: The authors’ views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect

the views of Marine Insight. Data and charts, if used, in the article have been
sourced from available information and have not been authenticated by any statutory
authority. The author and Marine Insight do not claim it to be accurate nor accept
any responsibility for the same. The views constitute only the opinions and do not
constitute any guidelines or recommendations on any course of action to be
followed by the reader.
The article or images cannot be reproduced, copied, shared, or used in any form
without the permission of the author and Marine Insight.

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Subhodeep Ghosh

Subhodeep is pursuing Naval Architecture and Ocean Engineering. Interested about the
intricacies of marine structures and goal-based design aspects, he is dedicated towards
sharing and propagation of common technical knowledge within this sector which, at
this very moment, requires a turnabout to flourish back to its old glory.

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