Explain shipping term Sheer and its purpose

This article explains the terms sheer, flare and camber in ship construction and its purpose

Sheer
Sheer is the rise of the deck in a fore and aft direction. The amount of the sheer is measured vertically from a level line through the deck at the midship to the deck at the two perpendiculars.

Purpose
a) To increase the reserve buoyancy at the ends of the vessel.
b) To counter the immersion of the ends that may occur during pitching and is important particularly for smaller vessels
c) To increase the "Seaworthiness of the ship, that is amount of water coming in on deck would be reduced
d) since fore end is more susceptible to immersion than the aft end, "standard sheer is a parabolic curve with sheer twice that of sheer aft. Modern ships have straight line sheer, often in the fore body only, in some cases only over the forward one third ship's length. Sometimes, very large ships, the minimum bow height is achieved without the need for sheer, conversely, very small vessels may hve very large sheer forward and aft

Flare and its purpose

Camber and its purpose