ABSTRACT
The design of economic and ecologically efficient structures ask for a minimized use of resources and materials. Despite the large application of structural optimization in academia and industry, there are no methods for structural optimization of cell guides for container securing on barges. The method described in this paper relies on optimization with purpose of weight and/or cost minimization. Loads are derived from hydrodynamic calculations, to represent the ultimate limit state (ULS). The method includes two basic elements. First, a parametric finite element model of the cell guides is created to perform an automated structural analysis of different design alternatives. Secondly, a particle swarm algorithm (PSO) finds the optimal structure through targeted parameter variation. The results show that the developed optimization method is suitable for the present case of application. It can be shown that the weight of the structure is successively reduced during the optimization process.
