When Osprey Technical were approached in 2019 to design and manage the complete integrated marine electronics solution on Nautor’s new superyacht, the ClubSwan 125, little did they know how important their remote, bespoke access system Vessel Fusion would become during the project.
A superyacht electronics project of this size and complexity includes a comprehensive package for all the navigation, instrumentation, marine communications and IT systems that run the yacht for sailing and racing. In addition, there are the internal communications and engineering systems, interior control systems, audio/visual and other specialist requirements, such as noise cancelling software in the master suite.
Preparation and planning phase
Just like preparing for any major yacht race, the key to a successful marine electronics installation is all about meticulous planning, understanding the exact requirements and making thorough and exact preparations.
For the ClubSwan 125, the Osprey Technical team spent considerable time going into depth on the project requirements. Working with the client representatives and the boatyard to clarify the client’s goals, the project needed to embrace the different types of sailing and planned racing events, as well as the desired onboard lifestyle, ambience and guest experiences.
With this information, initial studies took place to create the design specification, followed by detailed design work using Osprey’s own AutoCAD electronics package. A team of four worked on the detailed requirements and studies included looking at the likely ocean routings for transatlantic crossings, in order to establish the optimal mounting heights for technical communications equipment.
With the requirement for offshore racing and record breaking, much consideration went into weight reduction and equipment placement, such as the minimum mounting heights for the sat comms equipment. The goal being to reduce impact on vessel performance whilst maintaining good performance of the systems and crew safety. Specific communications and auto pilot systems were constructed and interfaced so that they could simply be removed for inshore sailing when not required.
Collaboration with other technical marine systems
A significant part of the design and specification stage was focused on working with the project’s other third party technical suppliers of equipment and bespoke technologies. Facilitating and overseeing the integration of all systems to avoid a large number of disparate and discrete systems and user interfaces. Ultimately all the systems are run through the IT infrastructure supplied and maintained by Osprey Technical.
The Team work in close collaboration with all the other specialist parties involved, to gain complete oversight and management of all requirements. With this level of insight, the design review stage includes a detailed specification of the equipment requirements for all the systems and instrumentation.
Read Part 2 - System specification for integrated marine electronics
See Part 3 - Vessel Fusion remote access to all technical marine electronics systems