PROPULSION DATA SERVICES, Inc.

NAVAL ARCHITECTS AND MARINE ENGINEERS

In the early1980's digital technology was advancing at an accelerating rate but adequate software and facilities to use it was out of reach of the average naval architectural firm or builder.

On January 1983 Propulsion Data Services, Inc. was formed by John Koopman to fill this void. Having extensive experience with mainframes, minicomputers, microcomputers and programmable logic controllers, all of the hardware needed to provide a technical support service was available just north of Boston. For software a long term personal project, the Propulsion Engine, was an ideal foundation for assembling software for stability, lofting and propulsion system analysis.

In less than a year, stability and propulsion analysis was being performed on custom built microcomputers complete with graphic cards and math co processors. Lofting was still being performed on mainframes where large format plotters could generate patterns. The vast majority of shipyards and most metal suppliers did not have N/C capabilities.

The list of regular clients, primarily naval architects and shipyards, was growing rapidly. Microcomputers were getting better but the publically available software was not.

By late 1986, the IBM PC had advanced to a capability comparable to the custom Zilog machines. The transition from custom microcomputers to the PC, warts and all, took place. With the addition of Cadkey as a formidable Unix and PC 3-D CAD system, 3-D lofting services expanded significantly.

By 1988 with the addition of an in-house large format flatbed plotter, the use of mainframes was reduced to jobs requiring extensive memory and storage such as FEA (Finite Element structural Analysis). Small FEA projects were done on the PC's but you had to be willing to wait.

The first luggable computers led to the next level in services. Multi-channel data acquisition using accelerometers, optical and magnetic tachometers and inclinometers provided the data required for modal analysis of vibrating machinery and structures as well as performance and vessel motion studies.

All of the above noted services are still the base workload of Propulsion Data.

The Propulsion Engine has evolved substantially. Stability calculations that took hours to complete in 1983 now take less than a second using high performance multi-core processors, graphic accelerators and solid state disks.

FEA is now done in-house although CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) is outsourced to facilities with super computers.

New to the Propulsion Engine are modules for analyzing vessel operational data using modeling and simulation  to optimize performance, reduce operating costs and reduce environmental impact.

What is next depends on what the marine industry requests.