For FSO operators
A guided, offline-capable app for the person on the vessel. Wizard-driven first-run setup, obvious buttons for baseline ROB and transfer/restock entry, and a signed export back to the Trader when the job is done.
Product status
MaeWest Blending is in pre-release development.
The pages below describe the intended workflow and blend methodology in detail. Signed installers and pricing will be announced when the product is ready for release. To register interest and be notified at launch, use the Contact page.
MaeWest Blending · Trader & FSO — charter-linked
Two apps, one signed conversation between shore and vessel.
MaeWest Blending connects the shore Trader and vessel FSO applications. It sits alongside MaeWest Cargo Operations for Office and Field workflows and MaeWest Surveyor for independent field reporting.
The shore Trader issues signed blend and transfer instructions; the vessel FSO records what actually happened and returns a signed ROB snapshot and execution report. No live network, no shared server — just verifiable file bundles that travel by USB, email, or network share.
For shore Traders
Author blend and transfer instructions with your own wording — no app-generated pro-forma text — and receive verifiable ROB snapshots and un-shipped-item reports from every FSO you charter.
For auditors and charterers
Every instruction, execution, and ROB snapshot is content-hashed and chained. The full history can be independently re-verified at charter close-out or during a dispute.
Trader — the built-in blend calculator
A marine-fuel blender the Trader can actually defend.
Most FSO shore desks still blend in a spreadsheet inherited from someone who left the company two charters ago. The Trader app replaces that spreadsheet with a first-class blend engine designed for ISO 8217 marine fuels — VLSFO, HSFO, ULSFO, MGO — that shows its working and signs the result.
Viscosity done properly
Kinematic viscosity is blended with the Refutas / ASTM D341 (MacCoull–Walther) viscosity blend number on a mass basis, and the temperature-corrected variant follows ASTM D7152. No linear-averaging shortcuts — the answer matches what an accredited lab will report on the certificate of quality.
Flash point & pour point
Flash point is combined via the Chevron / API flash blending index (Nelson form); pour point via the Chevron / Riazi pour-point index. Both are the industry-standard non-linear methods and are labelled as such in the on-screen breakdown.
Sulphur, density, water, ash, metals
Mass-weighted sulphur (mass %), density at 15 °C (kg/m³), water, sediment, ash and metals (V, Na, Al+Si, Ni, Fe, Ca, Zn, P) on ISO 8217 bases. Every input is either a measured component value or a supplier-certified reference.
ISO 8217 grade check
Pick a target grade (RMG 380, RMK 500, DMA, DMB, VLSFO 0.50 %S, ULSFO 0.10 %S…) and the blender shows pass/fail against every property in the table, with the individual margin on each parameter so the Trader knows where the headroom is.
IMO 2020 & ECA compliance
The sulphur result is checked against the correct cap for the operating zone — 0.50 % global cap, 0.10 % ECA (SECA) — and flagged if the blend would breach the applicable regulation for the intended voyage.
Show full spec & signed CofQ
A live spec badge on the Blender tab summarises the current blend at a glance. “Show full spec…” opens the complete property table, and one click emits a Certificate of Quality PDF with a QR verification block encoding the instruction hash and audit-chain head — independently checkable downstream.
The blending math lives in a separate, testable calculation library with a golden-value regression suite; every method above is documented in-code with its source equation so a marine chemist or vetting inspector can trace the arithmetic without reverse-engineering a spreadsheet.
Prediction accuracy. Sulphur, density, MCR and metals are mass-weighted and mathematically exact. Viscosity, flash and pour are non-linear index blends (Refutas / Chevron / ASTM-family) with a ±10–20 % method envelope, confirmed on the receiving-end lab CoQ. Every release is regression-tested against textbook worked examples and ISO 4259 reproducibility bands — see the methodology & validation page.
How it works
A four-step signed round-trip.
1. Trader issues an instruction
The shore Trader writes the blend or transfer instruction in their own words, signs it, and exports a bundle file. Nothing is transmitted automatically — the file is sent to the vessel by the operator’s preferred route.
2. FSO opens the bundle
The FSO app verifies the signature, warns if the file has been tampered with, and shows the Trader’s wording alongside the tanks and components requested.
3. FSO records the actual execution
The operator ticks the tanks that actually moved, enters observed ullages, densities, free water and S&W, and signs the execution. A carry-forward of unchanged tanks is included automatically.
4. FSO returns a signed bundle to the Trader
The Trader imports the returned bundle, sees the executed vs. requested comparison, and files the ROB snapshot into the vessel’s signed history.
Built for a first-time operator
Intuitive from the first launch.
FSO deployments change hands: new vessel, new crew, new Charter Party. The app is designed so a first-time operator can be productive on day one, without hunting through admin tabs or waiting for the first Trader instruction to arrive.
Getting Started wizard
On first launch the FSO app opens a four-step wizard: welcome, vessel identity, tank layout, and a first baseline ROB. Each step has a “Do it now” button that jumps straight to the right screen.
Baseline ROB from any survey
One button on the Overview tab captures a full-vessel baseline from an independent Inspector’s report — the reliable starting point for every subsequent transfer.
Record transfer / restock
Not every movement comes from a Trader instruction. A prominent button lets the operator record a signed transfer or restock (restock is just a Load transfer — the app makes that clear).
Demo mode for safe practice
Both FSO and Trader ship with a Demo mode button so operators can rehearse the full round-trip on synthetic data without touching real charter records.
Charter-linked, re-usable
Priced to match how FSOs actually operate.
An FSO deployment is time-boxed by its Charter Party — typically six to twelve months. The app is fully reconfigurable at charter roll-over: new tank layout, new vessel identity, new Trader counterparty, with the signed audit chain preserved.
Pricing is an annual per-vessel subscription that runs while the charter is live and can be renewed, paused, or reassigned when the next charter begins. When a subscription ends, an inexpensive archive licence keeps the signed history readable and exportable for auditors.
Launch readiness
What’s in the box at launch.
Included
- FSO desktop app (Windows, .NET 8) with wizard, baseline ROB, transfer/restock, and instruction-execution flow.
- Trader desktop app with instruction authoring, bundle import/export, and mirror-vessel management.
- Signed bundle format (SHA-256 content hash + envelope signature).
- Demo mode on both sides with a synthetic worked example.
- Getting Started wizard, F1 help topics in plain English, and dark-themed UI tested down to 1200×900.
Roadmap after launch
- Optional archive-viewer app for expired subscriptions (read-only, export-only).
- Signing-certificate rotation tooling.
- Additional inspector-report import formats.
- Multi-vessel Trader dashboard for operators running several FSOs concurrently.
- MaeWest BunkerProof — signed bunker-delivery reconciliation and shortfall/theft monitor built on the same Trader/FSO loop.