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Sounding Pipe

Sounding pipes are used to determine the depth and quantity of liquid in tanks on ships. Every tank must have a sounding pipe to allow manual or automated measurement. Sounding pipes are steel tubes that lead from tanks on a ship to the deck. Proper maintenance and closing of sounding pipe caps is important for safety to prevent flooding. Records of soundings are kept to monitor tank levels.

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Sandeep Kumar
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1K views

Sounding Pipe

Sounding pipes are used to determine the depth and quantity of liquid in tanks on ships. Every tank must have a sounding pipe to allow manual or automated measurement. Sounding pipes are steel tubes that lead from tanks on a ship to the deck. Proper maintenance and closing of sounding pipe caps is important for safety to prevent flooding. Records of soundings are kept to monitor tank levels.

Uploaded by

Sandeep Kumar
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Sounding Pipe

• In nautical terms, the word Sounding is used to


describe the process of determining the depth
of water in a tank or under a ship. Tanks are
sounded to determine if they are full or empty.
•   The process of quantifying the quantity of
liquid present inside a tank is called "sounding".
• Every tank on board not readily accessible must
be provided with a sounding pipe, other tanks
which are accessible may be provided with gauge
glass or any other means of finding depth of
liquid in the tank.
• Tanks may be sounded manually or with
electronic or mechanical automated
equipment.
• Electronic and mechanical automated
sounding may be undertaken with a variety
of equipment including float level
sensors, capacitance sensors, sonar, etc.
• The steel vessels with integral tanks are
required to have sounding tubes and
reinforcing plates under the tubes which the
weight strikes when it reaches the bottom of
the tank.
• Sounding tubes are steel pipes which lead
upwards from the ships' tanks to a place on
deck.
• Sounding pipe as far as practical must be
without bends and lead in the vicinity of tank
suction lowest part of the tank.
• Every sounding pipe must be protected against
deck cargo damage, must be provided with
means of water tight closing arrangements, in
case of screw down covers, the cover must be
secured with chain or any other arrangements
to prevent the cover from going adrift.
• Sounding pipes are to be as straight as possible
and to have a bore not less than 32 mm. Where
a sounding pipe passes through a refrigerated
compartment where temperatures may be 0°C
or below the bore is not to be less than 65 mm.
• Striking plates of adequate thickness and size
are to be fitted under open-ended sounding
pipe. The striker plate must be inspected and
replaced as and when deemed necessary.
Sounding Vs Ullage
• "Sounding" is the measure of distance from
the bottom of tank up to cargo level in the
tank.
• “Ullage" is the distance from the top of the
level of cargo to the maximum level or top of
the cargo tank.
• As sounding increases, the ullage decreases,
and as ullage increases, the sounding
decreases
• It is usual practice on ships to take ullage when
cargo/fuel oil is highly viscous.
• If the cargo/ bunkered oil is viscous, and if "sounding"
is taken, then the bob may get sticky and may
contribute false readings
• It is always necessary to take ‘sounding´ of the bunker
tanks to know the exact quantity of the fuel available
on board. Also during bunkering operation, the
quantity of fuel oil pumped on board is to be
monitored continuously so that the bunker tank does
not overflow.
• If it overflows, it may cause a Marine
pollution and as per ‘marpol´, spillage of oil
into the sea is prohibited.
• Hence Ships such as oil tankers, product
carriers and OBO (Oil/Bulk/Ore carrier) ships
as they carry oil/liquid as cargo in their cargo
tanks, sounding of those tanks should be
continuously monitored during
loading/discharging operations.
How to do?
• Within the sounding pipe, a steel flexible measuring
tape, with a bob attached at the end is lowered till it
strikes the bottom of the tank.
• When it strikes the bottom of the tank, the level
of liquid in the tank, makes an impression on the
‘sounding tape´ so that if we coil up the tape, the
impression of content of the tank is seen and the
readings are noted.
• The noted reading indicates the height of the liquid
in the tank. ‘Sounding table´ is available
onboard which is calibrated inconsideration with the
shape of the tank, and trim of the ship. The volume
of liquid in the tank is calculated from the sounding
table.
Sounding Note of Bilge and Tanks:
• The Chief Officer shall prepare the Record
Book for 'Sounding of Bilge and Tanks' and
shall have crew enter the result of soundings,
check it every day and affix his signature.
• If sounding is not taken for any reason such as
heavy weather, proper log entry must be
made stating the reason in the Record Book.
Record of Engine Room Bilge:
• The Chief Engineer shall have crew enter the
result of soundings of engine room bilge into
the M-zero Check List (or Sounding Note of
Engine Room Bilge) check it every day, and
affix his signature.
Sounding Pipe cap

• Deck sounding pipes pass through the


weather deck and are fitted with screw-down
caps.
• Sounding pipes for engine room & double-
bottom tanks are fitted with counterweight
self-closing cocks. It is imperative that
sounding pipe caps or cocks be kept shut and
well maintained. Sounding pipes are a
potentially dangerous source of progressive
flooding.

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