Product and Performance News

Ocean Nautical Innovations Develops Inflatable USP
The first inflatable Unmanned Survey Platform (USP) has been developed by Ocean Nautical Innovations of Belgium.
Named the Calypso the vehicle comes standard with a single beam echo sounder GPS 3G/4G Wi-Fi communication visualization and control tablet and a waterproof case for sensors. It has an auto navigation module which prevents the vehicle from hitting objects and allows for the planning of survey paths or areas. Because it is inflatable one person can deploy the platform and it is easy to transport. 
The Calypso can be equipped with a range of sensors for hydrographic and environmental surveys and can be controlled by the cloud platform Atlantis. By using Atlantis the data Calypso collects can be viewed in real-time anywhere in the world.  The software collects processes displays and stores the data which can be combined with survey data from other kinds of hydrographic equipment. 

Ocean Nautical Innovations inflatable Unmanned Survey Platform (USP).

Higgs Hydrographic Tek Introduces Survey Package
Higgs Hydrographic Tek of Florida has introduced an all-in-one hydrographic survey package called DREDGENAV. 
The package records depth data and real-time tide levels showing current position as an overlay on a hydrographic map. It can covert soundings to regularly spaced data and to different file formats calculate volumes of river sections or basins create depth contours and save them as vector files and design and generate theoretical channel designs. 
DREDGENAV comes with a 12.1-inch touchscreen and has a 30-volt input supply that is protected against surges and reverse polarity. It’s small size (11x9x3 inches) provides many installation and mounting options and when it is connected to power it can power all peripheral devices. 
The processor is enclosed in a fan-less vent-less case that is protected against dirt and vibration and provides 2GB of memory and a 500 GB hard drive. 

Higgs Hydrographic Tek DREDGENAV survey package.

Swathe Services to Represent Planck Aerosystems
Swathe Services is representing Planck Aerosystems in the United Kingdom and will be introducing the company’s ShearwaterTM Unmanned Aerial Vehicles to the UK market in early 2018. 
Through a series of both land and water demonstrations Swathe will present this specialized drone which can deploy in minutes and perform real-time inspection object detection and situational awareness. The drone has onboard computing capabilities with computer vision software and long-range digital communication. 
Swathe Services is based in the United Kingdom and offers product sales and support to the marine surveying industry as well as equipment rental and personnel deployment. 

Seatools Delivers Dredging Sensors to Jan De Nul 
Subsea technology company Seatools based in The Netherlands is delivering dredging sensors to the Jan De Nul Group for use in three trailing suction hopper dredges that are under construction. 
A variety of sensors are being sent all with the purpose of monitoring the dredging operations and increasing the efficiency on the finished dredgers. The delivery will include differential pressure rotation angle inclination and wire length sensors that will provide real-time data on dredging processes and equipment. 

The first sensors were sent in June of this year and the final delivery is scheduled
for September 2018.

Furuno Expands NXT Radar Series
Furuno has expanded its NXT Radar series with the introduction of the DRS6A-NXT. 
A main feature of the new radar is the Doppler “Target Analyzer” that automatically changes the color of targets that approach a boat. Green echoes are stationary targets that move less than three knots. The echoes are red if approaching targets are traveling faster than three knots. The feature works independently of the boat’s own speed. 
The radar tracks and records up to 100 targets in every sweep. Using Furuno’s True Tail feature the direction each target is moving is also shown. The “Bird Mode” adjusts echo enhancement so birds can be easily located and “Rain Mode” allows for target tracking in the rain. The DRS6A-NXT has both short and long-range target resolutions allowing for hazard location at 30 feet or out to 72 nautical miles. It has either a 2.3 1.9 or 1.4-degree horizontal beam width on a 3.5 4 or 6-foot open array. 
The NXT series radars have pulse compression and Doppler frequency shift sensing technology and are designed for use with NavNet TZtouch and TZtouch2 MFD’s. 

KROHNE Introduces Electromagnetic Flow Meter
KROHNE Inc. of Massachusetts announced the TIDALFLUX 2300 F electromagnetic flow meter is available.
The meter can be used for measuring effluent brine from dredging or mining activities providing flow measurement in pipes between 10 and 100 percent full. The accuracy in partially filled pipes is less than one percent of full scale while accuracy in full pipes is less than one percent of the measured value. The meter is wet-calibrated at the factory using direct volume comparison. 
Capacitive level sensors are integrated in the liner and electrodes are mounted at a height of ten percent from the pipe bottom to extend the longevity of the flow meter and provide more durability. 
The IFC 300’s application and device diagnostic and out-of-spec tests are available in the TIDALFLUX 2300F. 

KROHNE Inc. TIDALFLUX 2300 F Electromagnetic
Flowmeter.

Furuno Wins Two NMEA Awards
At this year’s National Marine Electronics Association’s (NMEA) annual conference and expo Furuno walked away with two new awards bringing its lifetime total of NMEA awards to 220. 
For the second year in a row the company’s DFF3D Multi-Beam Sonar won the “Technology Award” recognizing the radar’s ability to deliver side scan detection to more than 650 feet and depth sight to more than 1000 feet. 
The FAR2127 25kW IMO Radar won “Commercial Product of Excellence.” The radar is part of a larger series of X-Band and S-Band radars widely used on larger recreational vessels. 
The NMEA conference exhibits the latest products and provides four days of marine electronics training. This year’s event was held in Bellevue Washington over the last week of September. 

ALLU Group Opens New Location
ALLU Group is opening a new location in New Jersey to create additional warehouse and factory space needed to meet the demand for the company’s ALLU Transformer material processing attachments. 
The warehouse will store aftermarket parts while the factory space will allow for increased product inventory by local assembly. ALLU will now be able to offer remanufacture and re-certification of pre-owned buckets. The larger space will also provide more opportunity for service training. 
ALLU Group offers a complete line of technologically advanced screening crushing and soil stabilizing equipment and attachments.

ALLU Group’s New Location in New Jersey.

Hemisphere GNSS Upgrades Smart Antennas
Hemisphere GNSS Inc. of Berlin Germany has upgraded the S321 and C321 multi-frequency multi GNSS smart antennas to increase its functionality and management capabilities. 
Using Eclipse™P326 OEM board enables the antennas to support 394 channels and simultaneously track all satellite signals including GPS GLONASS BeiDou Galileo and QZss. 
Both the S321+ and C321+ come with Hemisphere’s Athena GNSS engine which provides centimeter-level RTK and Atlas L-band correction technologies that offers an 8-centimeter and 95 percent accuracy. Hemisphere’s aRTK™ technology is also preconfigured in the antennas allowing receivers to operate with RTK accuracies when RTK corrections fail. The antennas come with two long-life hot-swappable lithium batteries and both meet IP67 standard requirements. 
The S321+ comes with Hemisphere’s advanced processor SureFix™ to deliver high-fidelity RTK quality information with guaranteed precision and near 100 percent reliability. 
Hemisphere GNSS Inc. S321 and C321 smart antennas.

SBG Systems Expands Service Offerings
SBG Systems a manufacturer of inertial navigation systems has added “SBG +Services” to its technical services offerings. 
The company has several ways for new users of SBG equipment to get the training they need. The quickest is the “+Online Initiation” which is a two-hour virtual session with an SBG Support Engineer. A bit more in-depth is the “+On Demand Training” that allows customers to do on-site training either at SBG offices or at the customer’s place of business. Finally “+Intervention Day” is a pre-paid day used for training installation or on-site support. 
In addition to the training services SBG has also added “+Back-up System” service that will provide a replacement device if the original sensor needs a factory return and also “Check & Calibration” service so a sensor can be sent to the factory for a quality check firmware update cleaning or calibration in temperature and dynamics. Following a “Check & Calibration” the user is issued a certificate guaranteeing the quality of the sensor for three years. 

Codevintec Named New Distributor For Teledyne CARIS
Teledyne CARIS™ has chosen Codevintec as a CARIS software distributor for Italy the Adriatic countries Greece and Lebanon. 
Codevintec has been working in the Italian Earth and Marine Sciences market since 1973 and are professional distributors in the geomatics industry. It works with government agencies and private Italian organizations. In its new capacity the company will supply information on Ping-to-Chart™ hydrographic software solutions including support for Airborne Lidar Bathymetry operations big data management and autonomous operational solutions. 
Codevintec works from its headquarters in Milan and a subsidiary in Rome. Both locations supply technical assistance field support repairs testing customizations and systems integration. 
In 2000 Codevintec expanded to include 3D imaging technology covering land and sub-sea together with world leading companies and manufacturers. 
Codevintec features a main office in Milan and a subsidiary in Rome both featuring a well-equipped internal laboratory to supply technical assistance field support repairs testing customizations and systems integration. 

Dredge Yard Contracts With West African Mining Corporation
Dredge Yard has been contracted to design manufacture and deliver an ECO200 dredge with auger head to a mining corporation in West Africa. 
With a dredging depth of 6 meters (about 19.7 feet) and a 1500-meter (about 4920-foot) discharge pipeline the ECO200 Auger will be used for mining operations in a shallow river. Dredge Yard will install small extended knives on the auger to loosen compacted river sands that are then transported by the auger to the suction mouth. The dredge will be built on two pontoons to allow for efficient floating capacity in shallow draft. 
Dredge Yard has offices in the Netherlands The United Arab Emirates and the Republic of Turkey where it designs engineers manufactures inspects and tests a full range of dredging and mining equipment. 

Damen Dredge Uses SCHOTTEL Thrusters
SCHOTTEL provided two rudderpropellers type SRP 330 fixed pitch for the 60-meter (about 197-foot) dredge Tommy Norton built by Damen Shipyards Group.
Schottel said the principal characteristics of the SRP derive from the combination of propulsion and azimuth steering so there is no need for a rudder. The engine power is converted into thrust. The 360-degree rotation of the rudderpropellor provides full input power for manuervering.
Schottel said the SRP is the ideal propulsion solution where the focus is on optimizing the available power. The company provides advice and support in matters of hydrodynamics tank and model tests monitoring and steering options FE calculations ice-class considerations and special solutions.

The 60-meter dredge Tommy Norton is equipped with SCHOTTEL SRP 330 rudderpropellers.