Sponsored by the US Navy’s Office of Naval Research, this award continues a plan to renew America’s aging fleet of academic research vessels, including ocean ranging vessels like the US Navy’s Knorr (AGOR-15).
Markey Machinery was invited to join the team of Dakota Creek Industries and Guido Perla Associates as ship board handling systems integrator during the competitive design phase for the vessel in 2010. In fact the Markey offering was one of the reasons cited for awarding the vessel to the team.
The scope of the order is for one ship set, including two type CAST6-125 deep sea research winches with active motion compensation, a type DETW-9-11 all-electric traction winch system with two storage drums, one instrumented flagging block, one ship board wire monitoring system and a type WES-23 electric anchor windlass with two wildcats and two warping heads. All equipment furnished will be built by Markey at its Seattle USA location.
The type CAST6-125 is a third generation winch that can support research and explore depths with its drum capacity rated at 10,000m of 0.393 inch diameter electro-optical-mechanical cable. The winch features a close tolerance low mass moment of inertia drum for precise motion control of CTD/Rosette sampling instruments in sea state 5 environments. The feature eliminates unwanted ship motion, thus extending the life of cables for improved safety.
The winches use direct coupled vector duty 125hp non-proprietary, readily available electric motors. These vector duty motors are sourced in America and possess a substantial history of reliability in marine applications. The winches exceed new fleet design standards and wire rope factors of safety promulgated by United States academic institutions.
