Design and Implementation of a Ship Structural Ultimate Strength Prediction System Based on Smith Method

To address the issue of high dependence on imported software for ship structural ultimate strength prediction, this study designs and implements a ship structural ultimate strength prediction system based on the progressive collapse Smith method. The system is developed in-depth based on the general marine structural analysis software SAM (Structure Analysis of Marine Structures, SAM). While inheriting the general functional modules of the SAM software, it further develops specialized core calculation modules and pre and post processing modules for ultimate strength prediction. The core calculation module adopts the progressive collapse Smith method—currently the most widely used approach for ultimate strength calculation— while the pre and post processing modules are designed to align with the computational workflow of the Smith method. Test results from typical cases demonstrate that the developed system can accurately and efficiently complete model import and visualization, pre and post processing, and solution calculation. The computational results are consistent with expectations, achieving independent control over ultimate strength prediction.