Other loading programs are made to cover a specific ship type e.g. Dry Bulk Carriers or Tankers or Container ships.
 

MULTILOAD philosophy adjusts the type of cargo not to the ship type (e.g. Containers to a Container ship) but to a ship compartment. This way you can describe not only any ship type very easily but also any multi-purpose ship under one program.

The benefit of MULTILOAD is clear when you want to load a combination of cargoes e.g. No 1, 3, 5 Cargo Holds with grain, No 2, 4, 6 Holds with other dry cargo and containers on deck.
All other programs for one type of cargo at a time will fail to load the ship as described.
 

In MULTILOAD we have the following stability criteria:

1) IMO A167 for Cargo vessels
2) IMO Weather Criteria for Deck Cargoes
3) Timber Stability Criteria at Departure / Arrival
4) SOLAS 74, Grain Stability Criteria

By having specific stability criteria for a specific cargo carried you make sure that:

a) your ship complies with the International Requirements
b) You load more cargo (e.g. Timber Stability criteria are more relaxed than the IMO A167). Also, IMO Weather Criteria are more relaxed than U.S. Coast Guard Deck Cargo Criteria.
 

The modern ship operator having so many things to take care of every day, need not have also to remember which stability criteria to apply depending on the cargoes loaded. For this reason, very important decision is done automatically by MULTILOAD.

All the operator has to do is to load the cargoes desired and stability analysis is done automatically.
Even if you have combinations of cargoes MULTILOAD will decide if it is necessary to check two stability criteria simultaneously e.g. A 167 (Dry Cargoes) and SOLAS 74 (Grain Cargoes).
It should be noted that in the case of Timber Cargoes on deck we have different stability criteria for departure and for arrival. Also the arrival deck cargo is increased by 10% due to wettage. For these reasons, when loading Timber on deck MULTILOAD  assumes that you are in departure case and the user is required to  press the character “A” in order to switch to the arrival case. Again to switch back to the departure case you have to press “D”. All other details are handled by MULTILOAD.
 

When a weight is entered during Weight Input the following calculations and checks are performed.

 1) Capacity of the particular compartment being loaded
 2) Tank Top Strength of particular compartment (if tank top strength data is provided
    by client).
 3) Stability analysis / checks.
 4) Drafts (fwd-mid-aft) - Draft restrictions checks.
 5) Trim
 6) List or Heel if option available.
 7) Propeller immersion.
 8) Air Draft from Radar Mast.
 9) Longitudinal Strength (SF & BM).
10) Air Draft from hatches if option available.
 

As described earlier, during Weight Input you can change the Strength condition using Shift/F6. This function you can change the limits of SF & BM in order to assess if the calculated values are within permissible range. Typical cases are:

             - Sea Going Condition
             - Port Condition

But we may also have: - Sea Going Ballast condition or Ore Loading e.t.c.
It should be noted that all above conditions are the Max allowable limits that the calculated SF & BM are compared with. The method for the strength calculation is always that of Still Water Shear Forces & Bending Moments, irrespective of the Strength condition chosen. The calculation method “still water” with the “Port condition” is often confused by mistake.
 

During Weight Input the system calculates all loading parameters (see question 4 above) only for the final condition of the vessel, after the inputted weight has been loaded.

 In the “LOADING SEQUENCE WITH REPORT” option MULTILOAD calculates a series of intermediate steps between the each loading stage; making sure that the vessel condition is checked thoroughly and found in order during loading / unloading operations. If an extreme situation is found during this search then appropriate messages appear.
 

You can select any number of cargo types that appear on the CARGO TYPE SELECTION SCREEN. However, if your vessel can carry some other cargo type that does not appear on this screen (e.g. Timber Cargoes or Containers) then you should contact SMM Ltd. And ask for one or more of the MULTILOAD OPTIONS.