How Can I Accurately Measure Marine Vessel Dynamics?

Although the VBOX range of GPS data loggers and modules have been designed with the automotive industry in mind, it isn’t just the manufacturers of land-based vehicles that need to understand their dynamics. Boat designers and builders also have this requirement, and Racelogic’s VBOX Marine system is the solution.

The importance of boat testing

In some respects the fine-tuning of a water-borne vessel can be more crucial than that of a car or truck, due to the additional drag that a boat has to overcome in order to move efficiently through the water. But accurately measuring a vessel’s dynamic movement and attitude can be very difficult as traditional solutions commonly used on land are far harder to achieve; this is where high accuracy GPS can be of enormous benefit.

Marine testing challenges

Developing a boat to counteract the opposing forces of current and wind conditions so that it is running at peak efficiency have always been extremely difficult to measure. The advent of GPS in automotive applications has enabled manufacturers to carry out much more comprehensive and accurate testing than ever thought possible, and this is now available in the world of marine testing. Some of the fundamentals of testing automotive vehicle dynamics have equivalents in marine vessel testing: pitch, roll and yaw as exhibited by a car correlate to a boat’s trim, roll and lee.

How is this achieved?

GPS technology is ideally suited to marine testing - an open water environment ensures that any GPS equipment is guaranteed a perfect view of the sky (there aren’t too many trees in the ocean). This continuous testing method means that solutions can be found, and adjustments made based on the data produced, far faster than trial and error methods. As an example, the vessel’s speed or heading accuracy can be measured and recorded incredibly accurately against the slightest adjustments made to a craft’s trim angle, allowing for the correct planing attitude to be determined.

The technology

Within the VBOX range Racelogic have developed a product specific to the marine environment. This triple antenna GPS system is used to accurately measure the attitude of a vessel within its dynamic sphere, and allows for many parameters to be measured at once, such as:

This is achieved by comparing the relative height or heading between the antennas. These channels are all measured solely from GPS. Signals from the vessel’s onboard systems can also be logged with the use of additional input modules and/or CAN interfaces.

The VBOX Marine System is packaged in a waterproof case and includes a Bluetooth module for direct connection to a remote PC.

Full product details are available on the right.

Please contact us with specifics of your marine testing applications, and one of our technical sales team will be pleased to advise you.