Modeling and Simulation of the Roll Motions of a Ship

Abstract

At the Control Laboratory of the Electrical Engineering Department of Delft University of Technology much research has been carried out during the last 15 years in the field of ship control systems, with the main emphasis on automatic steering of ships. At the moment, the research is concentrated on the design of an autopilot which uses the rudder not only for course keeping but also for roll stabilization, where mostly stabilizing fins have been used up to now. Modeling experiments were carried out and based on their results a simple model of a ship describing the transfer between the rudder and the yaw motions was obtained. The model was subsequently used to design a Rudder Roll Stabilization, RRS, autopilot.