Hi all.
A couple of points.
An echo-sounder, fish finder, etc. as normally installed would require
the surface vessel to be almost on-top of the sub. A side scan
typically would require the surface boat to always be moving back and
forth with the sub broadside in order to image. I think both would have
pretty sever operational challenges when trying to track a sub.
The sport/scout do require the receiver to be in the water. As
delivered the sonar transducer and display electronics are co-located
in the same housing. So, yes you would get wet when attempting to use
if from a surface boat.
It would be fairly simple to open up the receiver, disconnect the sonar
transducer from the display electronics, connect it to a coax cable,
and run the display electronics remotely (like on a pole or in the
cabin). This would void the warranty... Remember that the transducer is
directional, so if it's rigidly mounted the relative positions of the
sub and chase boat would have to stay constant. You could run spirals
or something if you lost contact. If you do rigidly mount the receiver
I'd get a second one too. That way if you had to send divers or an rov
down to the sub you could relocate it easier.
A configuration which would be more like the typical diver application,
would be to pinger on a pole off the boat, and the receiver on the sub.
The sub could always get back the surface boat without surfacing.
If you want to move up to a "real" tracking system. There are lots.
Desert star has an sbl for about $10K, Linkquest was mentioned at $15K
for their USBL, then there is sonardyne, tritech, applied acoustics,
ORE, ixsea. I think that is everyone. There are companies like Asthtead
which rent these systems, which may be an option.
If I had to had to have a fixed budget though I'd get other gear before
a nav system I think.
1) Comms, like a OTS phone or something
2) Altimeter/depth sounder on the sub
3) Some imaging sonar, scanning or multibeam if I had the $$
4) Surface beacon (strobe/radio)
5) SBL/USBL acoustic nav system.
On 3/15/2010 12:18 AM, Jon Wallace wrote:
>
> Frank,
>
> Not addressed to me, but I'll throw in my two cents. Most
commercial > pingers are ultrasonic. The hydrophone that David came
up with uses a > "sonic" piezo element centered at around 3khz so it
would not be > resonant to the higher frequency commercial pingers
and would not > detect them.
>
> The Desert Star scuba pingers provide both direction and range and
can > be used exactly as you've described. Unfortunately we have
never been > able to succeed at getting directionality out of the
HBH (home-built > hydrophone) using 3khz piezo elements, however my
experience was that > it was very easy to determine range based upon
the loudness of the > "ping". Therefore, by running a grid-pattern
you could "home" in on > the pinger by just listening to whether the
sound was getting louder > or softer. Not the most efficient way of
finding an object by any > means, however, and similar to what you
would have to do with a > down-looking sonar or fish finder.
>
> Jon
>
>
>
ShellyDalg@aol.com
wrote:
>> In a message dated 3/14/2010 8:06:39 P.M. Pacific Daylight
Time, >>
alanjames@xtra.co.nz writes:
>>
>> I have only had experience with cheap fish finders & have
>> questions about their reliability,
>>
>> Hi David and Alan. Gulping air......well, OK.
>> Now back to the question of finding a sub......
>> If a sub has a pinger attached, could a surface boat find it
with the >> hydrophone you ( David ) made ?
>> Depending on directionality of the array, a direction for the
sub's >> location should be possible. Maybe then the pilot could
motor over in >> that direction and as the pinger got louder you
may be able to tell >> how close you're getting. At least staying
within a pre-set minimum >> distance. By rotating the pick-up you
would know if the surface boat >> needs to go left or right. Now,
if you passed OVER the sub and the >> pinger signal was now
coming from behind the pick-up the pilot would >> then stop or
get out of the way in case the sub was ascending to the >>
surface. Be a bummer to ram your own surface crew.
>> Maybe you could have two pingers with one stronger ( louder )
or more >> frequent so by listening you'd be able to tell how
close you were. >> What makes a pinger anyway ? Is it just a
thing that sends out a >> sound wave at a set interval ? It seems
the pick-up part is the hard >> piece to make. So the returning
signal can be figured how far away it >> is ( function of time ?
) and what direction it's coming from ( array >> set-up in
degrees ?)
>> Frank D.
>>
>
>
>
>
>
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