Towed Acoustic Antenna HUB Data Collection
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing data transmission architectures for towed linear acoustic antennas face challenges in managing the high density of cabling and ensuring robustness against failures, particularly in large antennas, leading to inefficiencies and incomplete data transmission.
Innovation Solution
A data collection system utilizing a 'Leapfrog' mechanism with HUBs that manage sensor data through a combination of main and auxiliary buses, allowing for redundant data transmission and fault tolerance by integrating data frames from multiple sources, ensuring continuous data flow even with faulty units.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If a fully parallel topology is used for data transmission, then system robustness at the DAU level is improved, but the number of wires required increases significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The system divides the antenna into multiple sections, each with its own DAU and synchronization module. This segmentation allows independent operation of each section while reducing the overall cabling requirements compared to a fully parallel topology across the entire antenna.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces synchronization modules as intermediary components that distribute timing signals to multiple DAUs. This mediator enables coordinated operation across sections without requiring direct parallel connections between all DAUs, thereby reducing cabling density while maintaining system robustness.
2Device complexity
If a serial data upload architecture on a common bus is used, then the number of wires is reduced, but the time division multiplexing capacity is limited by line length and number of subscribers
Solution Approach 1:
The antenna is divided into multiple sections, each with its own DAU and synchronization module. This segmentation creates multiple independent data transmission paths, allowing parallel data collection from different sections while using a shared bus architecture within each section, thus achieving both low cabling density and high data transmission capacity.
3Device complexity
If basic serial or parallel topologies are used, then the system is simpler to implement, but robustness against failures is insufficient
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements redundant synchronization modules and multiple data transmission paths within each antenna section. This beforehand cushioning ensures that if one path or module fails, the system can continue operating through alternative paths, thereby achieving robustness against failures while maintaining relatively simple implementation through modular design.
Data Source
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AI summary
The invention relates to a system for collecting sensor data from a towed linear acoustic antenna. The collection and the relaying of the sensor data are organized around acquisition modules, or HUBs, chained to one another. Each HUB of rank n, or HUBn, manages the collection of the data from a plurality of sensors and simultaneously receives, on a first input linked to the HUBn-1 of rank n-1 situated immediately upstream, a first sequence of data frames and, on a second input linked to the HUBn-m situated m ranks upstream, a second sequence of data frames. The HUBn incorporates, into each received data frame, the synchronous data of said frame that are produced by the various sensors managed thereby and delivers one and the same completed frame; on two separate outputs, linked respectively to the HUBn+1 situated immediately downstream and to the HUBn+m situated m ranks downstream.