RESPONSE OF ARTICULATED TOWERS TO WAVES AND CURRENT.

There has been an increasing use of mobile offshore systems in the North Sea for storing and loading oil into attendant tankers. A typical type of mobile loading and storage system is the articulated buoyant loading tower. This paper analyzes the motion of a single articulated tower without a tanker under the combined action of forces resulting from current and a train of regular linear waves. The dynamic response of the tower is obtained by formulating the equations of motion by Lagrange's method. The wave forces are determined using a modified form of Morison's equation that accounts for the relative motion of the water particles with respect to the structure.