SEVERNAYA VERF SHIPBUILDING PLANT OPTIMISTIC ABOUT THE FUTURE

Valery Venkov
 

The Severnaya Verf shipbuilding company is open to cooperation and looks confidently into the future.

he history of the Severnaya Verf shipbuilding plant dates back to 1912 when the Putilovskaya Verf plant was built on the southern shore of the Neva Bay. The plant was intended to build high-speed combat surface ships, i.e., destroyers and frigates. These ships were to destroy enemy vessels with torpedoes and cannon fire and to escort large formations, guarding them from surface and submarine attacks. They were also used to lay mines and reconnoiter.

Assembly of bottom and board sections

In 1913, Russia's first destroyer, Novik, was launched at Putilovskaya Verf. At that time, the ship was classified as a mine- laying cruiser. Novik was the world's first destroyer with a steam-turbine plant which used liquid fuel. The plant had first-class building berths and machinery shops. During World War I, Russian destroyers built at Putilovskaya Verf proved to be universal ships capable of fulfilling tasks earlier set to only light cruisers.

Since its foundation, the plant has built over 330 ships for the Russian Navy, which has included mostly cruisers, destroyers, frigates, antisubmarine ships and minesweepers.

In the late 1950s, the plant underwent complete reconstruction, and its equipment and technologies were renewed. Currently, Severnaya Verf is one of the leading shipbuilding plants in St. Petersburg and the whole of Russia. It has state-of-the-art equipment and specializes in several fields.

The ship's covered slipway with four berths makes it possible to build and repair ships of various classes, 170 meters long and 20.5 meters wide, year round, irrespective of weather conditions. Cranes used at the berths have a load capacity of up to 50 tons.

Slipway

The plant also has four open berths, 170 meters long and 24 meters wide, equipped with cranes with a load capacities of 30 to 100 tons.

The plant's slipway comprises a floating dock with a load-carrying capacity of up to 10,000 tons, and a transborder, which makes it possible to launch ships from any slip or to place them on a slip.

The metal-working shops are fitted out with presses and high-capacity equipment for the plasma cutting of sheet metal. The hull-assembly shops use all the latest metal welding techniques.

All stages of shipbuilding are mechanized and automated, and industrial robots are widely used. Ships' bottoms and boards are made using computer-adjusted equipment. The pipe-working shops have high-capacity equipment, including high-frequency heating and numerically controlled machine-tools.

In the outfitting and machinery shops, assembly is done on a modular basis, which makes it possible to do up to 60 percent of all pre-assembly at special stands in favorable conditions.

The electroplating shops use modern technologies and equipment for the chemical cleaning of and applying protective coating to pipelines and reservoirs.

The outfitting berths are equipped with cranes with load capacities of 10, 16 and 30 tons. In the past few years, microprocessor equipment, automated systems of design, production preparation and production control, equipment and production lines have been used on a large scale.

The introduction of computer technologies, the ISO-9000 international quality system standard, and modern management methods has enabled the enterprise to win orders for the construction of naval and merchant ships for export and thus stabilize its financial and economic position.

Project #956E destroyer

Developing Putilovskaya Verf's traditions, the Severnaya Verf shipbuilding plant has highly qualified specialists and great technological potential. The plant's favorable location right near the entrance to the Gulf of Finland's Sea Canal creates good conditions for its modernization and extension. The implementation of St. Petersburg's plans for restructuring local shipbuilding plants gives Severnaya Verf a good chance of becoming a compact and high-technology enterprise.

In 1997, the plant won a contract for the export-oriented construction of Project #956E destroyers. According to experts, ships of this type are more efficient than their foreign counterparts. The plant has built 17 such ships for the Russian Navy. Currently, the plant's management are considering plans to build Project #1135.6 frigates for export.

The plant has extensive ties with enterprises in Russia and other countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States which supply it with materials and equipment for building, repair and modernization of ships and for repair and adjustment of various kinds of systems and armaments.