Project 8 : Racing Yacht Sail Control System

You are a team of engineers designed to develop a sail control system for a racing yacht. This system is designed to ensure the optimum sail settings for given weather conditions. Thus the position of the wind relative to the desired sailing direction will determine the positioning of the sail while the wind strength and the loading of the mast will determine the amount of sail put out as excessive sail in strong winds can lead to snapped masts.

Monday, 29 November 2010

Boat speed sensors

Dual speed sensor
"Non-contact magnetic sensors that measure the collapse of magnetic field due to the interruption by a ferrous gear tooth. These sensors provide two analog signal outputs (sine wave) that does not require an outside power source. This sensor is suitable for speed sensing with a range from 30 to 1000 inches per second with a target gear from one tooth per revolution to 32 pitch gear. "
This sensor could be implemented with the following steps;
  1. Sensor(s) measure the boat speed (from the gear tooth etc)
  2. the measured data is then sent to the CPU/Microcontroller, which then selects any adjustments required (done from pre-set favoured data) to the wind angle/heel angle or a combination of the two.
  3. if any changes are required, then a siginal is sent to a rotational sensor (mast) to adjust the wind angle data to correct for the angle of the rotating mast.


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