Looking for a set of calculation tools for strength assessment of rotating machinery components and systems? Look no further.

In recent years, Nauticus Machinery has been gradually improved, and four service patches are released in addition to a new member of the Nauticus Machinery family; the Torsional Vibration tool for steady state vibration analysis of marine propulsion systems. Major parts of Nauticus Machinery will in 2007 be ported to Microsoft .NET technology and new programming languages. For you as a user, this means new graphical user interfaces and to some extent important changes in the mathematical algorithms. We have received constructive feedback from our user community; the most important proposals will be implemented in the software.

The following Nauticus Machinery development projects will be completed in 2007:

• Brix Explorer, new framework for machinery calculations
• Nauticus Machinery Shaft Alignment, new user interface and solver
• Nauticus Machinery Torsional Vibration, new version supporting systems with several engines.

Overview of the new Brix Explorer configuration for Nauticus Machinery

Brix Explorer
Brix Explorer, configured for Nauticus Machinery, will be released in May 2007. Brix Explorer is the main entry point to all Nauticus programs. It organises the work and gives easy access to various templates and utility tools for typical tasks to be carried out. In Brix Explorer, calculation jobs can easily be reassigned to other users. Through a multi-user environment, all calculations are saved in a common database. The calculations can be organised in a user-defined hierarchy functional breakdown of propulsion system). You can easily add Nauticus calculations, third-party calculations (e.g. spreadsheets) and attachments (drawings or similar) to the hierarchy. One important feature of Brix Explorer is the open environment which makes it possible to add in-house calculations; it does not have to be a Nauticus Machinery
calculation.

Shaft Alignment
A new version of the Nauticus Shaft Alignment tool is planned to be released in September 2007. The current version has become a very popular analysis tool at yards and design offices, due to its simple method of analysing the bending behaviour in the shaft line and obtain important verification results. The coming release will contain a new three-dimensional modelling interface and an improved mathematical solver.
Other enhancements in the release are:

• Improved result and reporting features
• New advanced bearing model (using multi support point approach)
• Improved handling of operating conditions and condition-dependent input
• Improved handling of oil film stiffness in whirling calculations
• Free and forced whirling analysis.

Torsional Vibration
The control of vibration levels in propulsion systems and generator sets is essential to have a machinery that operates safely and reliable. The wrong combination of individually satisfactory components may lead to an inappropriate system. Nauticus Torsional Vibration is a software tool that analyses the torsional vibration levels in the propulsion system and identifies critical components.

In the release at the end of 2007, the program will be updated to handle more complex types such as systems with more than one engine. Typically, there could be diesel-electric systems with complex reduction gears and two propeller shaft lines, and improved features for multi-engine systems.