Page 51: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (June 2021)

Tech Files

Innovative products, technologies and concepts

Damen, Hydromaster Develop

Batteries tmax patents valve for Lithium-

New Ferry Thruster

Ion Battery Housing for improved safety in the event of ? re.

In 2020, Damen signed a contract with Blue Amigo

The use of lithium-ion batter- for the delivery of nine passenger vessels to operate on ies is associated with high ther- a Dutch ferry service known as the Waterbus. Damen mal risks, an important topic as identi? ed that six of the vessels – hybrid carbon ? ber wa- batteries increasingly pop up in ter buses that will operate fast, inter-city routes – would maritime vessel design. With require a fully azimuthing, 360-degree thruster to make the newly developed and pat- docking easy and propulsion fast. Damen approached ented pressure compensation Hydromaster, and the companies joined forces to devel- and pressure overload valve op the new thruster. “We had already been working on (PCO valve), tmax provides in- something that would meet these requirements,” said Jan creased ? re protection in case

Terlouw, commercial manager, Hydromaster. “A 375kW thruster, able to operate at speeds of up to and beyond 25 knots and durable enough to cover over 4,000 hours each year. But we had never built it.” Before that, however,

Hydromaster went to MARIN to develop the hydrome- chanics necessary to produce the thruster. MARIN was able to come up with the solution – a propeller of 840mm diameter with a clearance of 23% diameter from the hull tmax

Damen & Hydromaster -reducing vibration to a minimum and allowing for in- creased ef? ciency. For control of the thruster, Damen has of a so-called thermal runaway.

developed in-house a single joystick controller.

Since lithium-ion batteries are currently made primarily with oxidic cathode material due to the high charging density, an ig-

Kongsberg Debuts New nited ? re will continue to supply

Waterjet Control Systems itself with oxygen. It will keep burning even inside the closed

Kongsberg Maritime launched a pair of water- housing, which creates the risk jet control systems based on its new JCS of propagation, i.e. the ignition (Jet Control System) common technology of other, neighboring battery platform: JCS Compact and JCS Ex- cells. tended. JCS Compact is a closed-loop

Without appropriate measures control system solution designed to in the design, the pressure gen- manage the steering, reversing bucket erated inside the housing be- and optional interceptor functions on comes too high, there is a risk of small- to medium-sized waterjets. It bursting or a failure of the seal- can be used with either one or two ing systems and the highly toxic control stations and a single or dual ? ue gases can escape uncon- waterjet propulsion con? guration.

trolled. The valve is designed

JCS Extended applies the same func- to prevent such an event and in- tionality but on a larger, more advanced stead release the ? ue gases into scale. www.kongsberg.com the environment in a controlled process once a de? ned overpres-

A high-contrast 2.8” display panel provides steering sure has been reached. angle and reversing bucket position. Variable bright- www.tmaxgroup.com ness control for direct sunlight and night-time ops.

Kongsberg Maritime www.marinelink.com 51

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