Marine vessel performance diagnostics

Abstract

According to an example embodiment, a method (300) for a marine vessel that employs a propulsion system including a propeller mounted to a rotatable shaft for converting rotative shaft power transferred from the shaft to the propeller into thrust to propel the marine vessel across water is provided, the method (300) comprising obtaining (310) measurement values that include at least respective measurement values that are descriptive of the shaft power, the thrust and speed through water of the marine vessel, estimating (320), on basis of said measurement values, at least one of first excess shaft power caused by fouling of the propeller and second excess shaft power caused by fouling of the hull of the marine vessel, wherein the estimation of the first excess shaft power is carried out separately from the estimation of the second excess shaft power; and issuing (330) at least one of indication concerning propeller cleaning at least in dependence of the first excess shaft power and an indication concerning hull cleaning at least in dependence of the second excess shaft power.

Description

technical field [0001] The present invention relates to a diagnostic arrangement for assessing the operational efficiency of a marine vessel. Background technique [0002] In marine vessels, the primary method used to generate thrust to move a watercraft involves the use of vessel propulsion. At a very high level, a marine propulsion system includes a propeller attached to a rotatable shaft, while one or more engines in the vessel are arranged to rotate the shaft, thereby providing the thrust required to move the vessel. The characteristics of these (and other) components of a ship's propulsion system are designed so as to provide a desired or required amount of thrust and a desired operating efficiency taking into account, for example, the ship's hull design and ship's size. In some cases, a vessel may be provided with multiple marine propulsion systems as described above in order to achieve a desired / required amount of thrust and / or operational efficiency. [0003] In us...

AI Technical Summary

Problems solved by technology

These factors result in increased fuel consumption, extended journey times to destinations, or both, in any case potentially resulting in undesirable economic impacts

[0004] While regular cleaning of underwater components of marine vessels is an immediate solution for this cause of degraded marine vessel performance, the cleaning process is often time-consuming and involves additional costs, so it is highly desirable to ensure that it is only performed when strictly necessary. Set out to clean underwater parts of marine vessels

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