L-Cat French Navy equipped with FT NavVision
Posted on 10. Dec, 2009 by admin in FT NavVision
L-CAT Landing Catamaran
Free Technics recently delivered the first of a series of Catamarans developed for the French Navy. A custom-made catamaran design capable of transporting e.g. two tanks over water at high speed, and dropping them at the beach. Like the landing doors, the deck can dynamically move, and can also operate when submerged. This gives the vessel unique anbd surprising capabilities, other than the high-speed transport of armored vehicles and troops. The difficulty of the moving deck is that, on lowering the deck, the differences between the multiple measuring points may only be of the smallest amounts.
These measuring points are distributed to FT NavVision® using a WAGO PLC and its inputs. The FT NavVision® system, through Wago, takes care of the processing of the measured data and controls of the hydraulics, but also for the display & status of the deck and landing doors. Furthermore, each hull is fitted with two MTU engines and a generator, all monitored by FT NavVision®. Each hull is independent of the other and can operate on its own.
In close co-operation with Pochon Professionel, we created an installation that takes care of the alarm-management and control over the engine room. Also, all fire-, bilge- and door-alarms, as well as any engine- and generator-alarms are displayed.
Helm L-CAT, showing FT NavVision boot-screen
Next to these vital tasks, the moving deck is also monitored and controlled using FT NavVision® and Wago PLC’s, while its current status is displayed on screen using dynamic imagery. To this end, we created additional images that give a clear and concise view of the deck’s movement and status. Concerning engines and generators, we developed 6 dedicated viewers next to the general viewers in order to be able to monitor each generator and engine in great detail, real time.
The system has been delivered under classification by Bureau Veritas, and also approved on board by the same society. All alarms are processed according to the rules set in the “Unmanned Engine Room” brief, and distributed to the multiple alarmstations fitted in the various huts on board. The vessel has been sailing quite a while already, and both importer and client are pleased with the final outcome of the project based on FT NavVision®.
