About PPUs
Portable piloting units give pilots their own source of extremely accurate heading
and positioning data.
They use special piloting software, overlaid on official electronic charts. The positions
of surrounding ships can also be shown.
A PPU is an important tool in:
- Avoiding accidents
- Safer movement of ships through busy waters
- Avoiding berthing incidents
- Increasing the operating window in poor visibility and at night
- Replacing extremely expensive laser docking systems
- Used as a training aid
As pilots become less immune to prosecution, they must prove they have used all available
tools to help avoid an accident. PPUs are such a tool, and are becoming increasingly
accepted by the piloting community.
The cost of a PPU is quickly recovered due to the increased operating window they provide.
The risk of expensive accidents is also minimised.
How they work
There are several methods of achieving real-time position and heading information:
- DGPS
- RTK
Each method uses signals from satellites and/or ground stations to provide data to the
PPU. They all give a different level of accuracy, which is usually reflected in the price.
They will also give different degrees of reliability and smoothness in different situations. For
these reasons, accuracy is not the only important factor in selecting the correct PPU.
Careful research will ensure you get the reliability you need without paying a high premium for
accuracy you cannot use.
ยป Click here for a comparison of docking systems.
PPUs Today
The best PPUs are wireless, weigh as little as 5kg and are set up in less than two minutes.
They are known as 'full-function', because they give position and heading data and can
accept an AIS feed.
The best software is sophisticated yet easy to use. Although it has many useful features,
such as recording the passage and predicting the future path of the vessel, it will not distract
the pilot from the task. It is designed specifically for pilots and is regularly updated.
PPUs have been available for less than ten years, and in the early days some manufacturers
did suffer from reliability problems. This need not be your experience. Buy a Navicom
Dynamics PPU, place it on the rail and in less than two minutes you will be
navigating - first time.
Some of our PPUs have worked reliably for over three years before being sent for service.
involved with for years. Normally they go through endless teething problems before you get
anywhere near the promised results, but it worked straight away. I'm amazed how willingly
the pilots have adopted it; some of them were quite opposed to the whole concept."