Ship Stability Fundamentals and Simpson's Rules

Understanding how ships remain upright and safe at sea is the cornerstone of naval architecture and marine engineering. This text-based course introduces you to the essential physics of ship stability and the mathematical tools used to calculate hull volumes and waterplane areas. You will transition from knowing basic marine concepts to confidently performing stability calculations and understanding how modern computational tools evaluate ship safety. What you'll learn: - Understand foundational terminology like buoyancy, center of gravity, metacentric height, and righting levers. - Apply Simpson's First and Second Rules to calculate areas, volumes, and centroids of irregular ship hulls. - Analyze how loading, discharging, and shifting weights affect a vessel's trim and stability. - Explore the role of modern computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and numerical integration in contemporary ship design. - Evaluate stability criteria and safety standards used to prevent maritime accidents. We begin with essential terminology, hydrostatic principles, and historical design contexts, before moving into step-by-step mathematical applications of Simpson's Rules and modern digital design workflows. This course is designed for aspiring naval architects, marine engineers, maritime students, and enthusiasts with no prior experience in ship stability. Start reading today to build a strong theoretical foundation in maritime engineering.