Seakeeper Gyro Stabilization For Smaller Boats

From www.boattest.com

Dec 22, 2019 - Source: https://boattest.com/view-news/6317_seakeeper-gyro-stabilization-for-smaller-boats

Seakeeper

Seakeeper is the best-known company building control moment gyroscope stabilization systems for boats (Mitsubishi and Quick are also in the game) and they make the eyebrow-raising claim that one of their units can reduce rocking and rolling by up to 90-percent.

How does it work? Inside the Gyro, there’s a big flywheel that spins to create torque. The flywheel spins in a vacuum and the unit is cooled with a glycol/seawater system, so that the flywheel can spin at up to around 10,700 rpm and at over 550 mph. This naturally produces angular momentum—in other words, torque. One way to picture the forces at work is to think of a spinning top. As long as it’s spinning quickly, momentum keeps it upright and level. Since the Seakeeper is powered and it always spins at a controlled rate, that momentum is always present.

 

Active Control

The momentum, and the torque it creates, counteract the force of a boat’s rolling motion. As the boat rocks (or tries to rock) in the waves, hydraulic arms tilt the orb containing the flywheel fore and aft. This naturally applies the force of the torque to port and starboard. Seakeeper calls this “Active Control.”

An onboard computer senses rolling motions and tells the arms when and how far to tilt the orb to effectively counter the rolling motion of the boat. As the computer monitors each rolling cycle, it constantly adjusts the orb and the torque it is creating to effectively counteract that side-to-side motion.

A close-up of the orb that is tilted by the hydraulic arms.

The same Control Moment Gyroscope technology used by Seakeeper comes from spacecraft attitude control systems, which are being used at this very moment on the International Space Station. Four of them, in fact. Our advice: don’t worry too much about understanding the physics behind it. Instead, get on a boat with a Seakeeper and feel the difference for yourself.

Check out the full article here: https://boattest.com/view-news/6317_seakeeper-gyro-stabilization-for-smaller-boats