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From grand prix raceboats to superyachts, Synapse is taking load sensing to a whole new level and turning America’s Cup style data analysis into a more accessible, easy-to-use solution for a wider range of sailors
The sharp end of sailing is a numbers game and load sensors play a pivotal role. The volume of data can easily become overwhelming and it’s often a challenge to calibrate, manage, store and interpret it effectively. What has been missing in the marketplace, until now, is a fully integrated solution. North Technology Group has created a new division – Synapse, a spin-off from their composite rigging maker, Future Fibres – to fill that gap. The load-sensing systems that
most grand prix sailing teams rely on are complex and highly bespoke. Modern superyachts have broadly similar setups, albeit for different reasons with safety as the main focus. Synapse offers a complete system that logs, displays, distributes, manages and stores all the data that any racing team or superyacht captain is likely to need, along with a tailored suite of user interfaces and software tools to help with analysis. A stand-out feature of Synapse
is that its load cells are built into the terminations of Future Fibres rigging. ‘The unique advantage is that we measure load and strain in line with the load and we don’t have to add any links,’ says Synapse general manager Nick Christensen,
62 SEAHORSE
formerly head of design at Future Fibres. ‘With a load pin, you’re bending the pin and measuring the strain of bending. That relies on getting the setup for calibration and the setup on the boat exactly the same. As soon as you start pulling in a slightly different direction the pin is no longer calibrated to do that. But if you’re pulling in line with the rig there are no arguments, you can’t possibly pull that in a different way because it just gets pulled in tension. So we know the calibration we do in the lab is exactly transferrable to the setup on the yacht..’ The benefits for riggers and engineers are obvious. ‘When I was at Future Fibres, we encountered challenges with our rigging teams visiting boats equipped with load pins and electronics that were outdated or malfunctioning,’ Christensen recalls. ‘There might be a barrel pin and the mast was raked back in a different direction. So the engineers would have to go through a tedious process of going up and down on the shims, applying different loads and comparing that with the models before they could trust the pins. With these new load cells built into our rigging, it’s out of the box trustworthy and good to go.’ The inherent uncertainty of uncalibrated load pin readings,
Above: Synapse load cells integrated into the V1 and D1 turnbuckles of Future Fibres rigging cables on the foil-assisted Baltic 111 Raven
which can be up to 10 per cent, is thus eliminated. Synapse load cells are built into
a wide range of rigging components such as custom turnbuckles for V1 and D1 shrouds, upper or lower end headstay terminations, and various types of lashing eyes for the upper end of running backstays. ‘For backstays it makes more sense to put the load cell in the upper end because it doesn’t move much,’ Christensen explains. ‘When you ease a leeward runner its lower end moves a lot. If you put a load cell there, the cable carrying the signal would have to ease with it, requiring a lot of extra length or use wireless transmission which has its own challenges, frequency and battery life among them.’ Synapse can also replace ram jaws with load cell jaws for any hydraulic ram and integrate sensors into mast base compression shims. There’s a lot more to Synapse
than load cells. The hub of the system is the Nucleus processor which logs all the data locally, distributes it in real time to onboard systems such as Sailmon or B&G, and importantly, also to users’ phones and tablets or laptops via a web browser offering some unique features. The Nucleus unit weights about 1kg and has 64GB of internal
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