Ship Propulsion

Kwant Controls was raised in 1937 as a manufacturer of nautical instruments. The company is known for its ship propulsion systems which it has delivered and commissioned for various types of vessels. These systems typically consist of bridge equipment with levers and handles and PLC reading and sending data to ship's engine and rudder.

Traditionally the propulsion control system would have been tested during a factory acceptance test and during commissioning onboard of the vessel, to gain confidence in the system. Instead, Kwant took a different approach using Hardware in the Loop (HIL) testing.

Setup

Kwant uses a Bachmann M1 controller to run the control system. This controller is able to run external tasks as C-code. With the software packages 20-sim and 20-sim 4C Kwant can run plant models directly as C-code on the M1 controller.

Plant Model

The model of the core control system, engine and ship were developed in 20-sim. The figure below shows in green the core control system and in yellow the plant model.

Test

After validation the plant model was converted into C-code and deployed on the Bachmann M1 system using 20-sim 4C. HIL simulations were conducted to test the performance of the control system and the proper operation of the bridge equipment. Traditionally the propulsion control system would have been tested during a factory acceptance test and during commissioning onboard of the vessel. HIL-testing saved a considerable amount of time during the commissioning. Future savings are expected to be even larger because of the reuse of propulsion models.