Rolls-Royce delivers its 1000th thruster for drillship newbuild

Rolls-Royce has just delivered its 1000th UUC underwater mountable thruster.

It is the third unit in a series of six being installed on Seadrill’s new mobile drilling ship currently under construction at Samsung Heavy Industries in Korea.

John Knudsen, Rolls-Royce, President – Commercial Marine said: “While we are proud of this achievement, the true significance of the milestone is that it demonstrates the trust that our customers place in us to deliver world class propulsion equipment that is mission critical to their successful operations. Developing highly innovative power and propulsion products and systems to support our customers’ needs has always been our focus, and will always be our focus.”

UUC thrusters are used to move a mobile drilling unit from one location to another, and particularly for keeping the unit stationary whilst in continuous dynamic positioning mode during drilling operations, often in extremely deep waters.

As most rigs operate in remote locations, Rolls-Royce says that a very important feature of the UUC range is that they can be removed and installed underwater without drydocking the vessel.