Which altimeter is right for me? – Transcript
This week we’re going to focus on looking at our range of underwater altimeters which is the ISA500 range.
One of the questions we often get asked by people first approaching us to learn more about the ISA500 altimeter is; ‘Which altimeter is right for me?’
In the ISA500 range we have around about 11 different configurations of altimeter so this range is different housing materials, different housing configurations and some without housings at all. What I’ll do initially is just talk you through some of the options that are available.
What does the forward looking, titanium altimeter look like?
One of the altimeters, this is the ISA500 in titanium and we refer to this as the forward-looking housing as the transducer looks straight out the end of it and this is the first model we launched back in 2015 and since then we’ve added additional models to the range.
The ISA500 in titanium, forward looking has the capability to measure up to 120 meters away from the seabed. Depending on the the seabed type you may actually get a longer range than this. We’ve had up to 175 meters when we have a rocky seabed which is a really good acoustic reflector to get long range measurement capability and you also get a very high degree of accuracy.
The ISA500 itself actually resolves range to 0.7 millimeters then rounds up the nearest millimeter. There’s a little example in the background here running.
We’ve got an ISA500 in our test tank just here, measuring distance here so you can see the distance being measured on the screen there. It’s measuring about 0.628 meters and so you can see the last digit there, that’s the millimeter value and you see it’s very stable very accurate.
As the altimeter is moved just slightly you’ll see that value change up and back down towards the base of our tank. The ISA500 provides long-range capability and very high degree of accuracy as well.
Optionally integrated into the altimeter is heading pitch and roll and so you can see that being fed out here, we’re heading to magnetic north and pitch and roll as well so it’s a magnetic north that’s accurate plus or minus half a degree and the pitch and roll is accurate to 0.2 degrees.
What does the right angled, titanium altimeter look like?
That’s the ISA500 in titanium, forward looking. We also do the same sensor, the same capabilities in terms of range and accuracy in what we call the right-angled housing configuration. Essentially instead of having the transducer pointing forward it points out to the side. This is quite a useful configuration if you want to put the ISA500 altimeter into a slimline form factor vehicle such as an AUV or if you want to put it onto a towed tool or towed sensor such as a magnetometer and it’s the right kind of profile to fit within the nose cone and point down to the seabed and give you range.
What does the plastic altimeter look like?
Then we also do the altimeter ISA500, in acetal plastic and forward-looking configuration and acetal plastic, right-angled configuration. The dimensions and capabilities in terms of range and accuracy are exactly the same as the titanium counterparts, the only things that change are the weight gets a little bit lighter in the plastic and also the depth rating.
The titanium sensors as standard, are depth rated to 6,000 meters, in acetal plastic they’re depth rated to 1,000 meters so still more than sufficient for a lot of shallow water application work.
Hopefully you know which altimeter is right for you now? This is just one question we hope has been answered for you, if you have more please take a look at the Altimeter Academy.
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