2.1 Mechanical Installation Introduction

The Seakeeper 3 can produce forces of up to 1,934 lbs (8.60 kN) in the vertical direction,1,224 lbs (5.44 kN) in the longitudinal direction, and 150 lbs (0.67 kN) in the lateral direction at each of the four mounts. These forces should be considered to be acting simultaneously, fully reversing, and will repeat an infinite number of times. Careful consideration should begiven to foundation design to ensure it is capable of transferring these loads into the hull. These loads do NOT include vessel motion accelerations, such as vertical slam loads which can be significant for high speed vessels. The responsible party for designing the supporting structure (boat builder, installer, or hired sub-contractor) must accommodate the above forces plus a reasonable factor of safety. Seakeeper recommends a minimum safety factor of 3.0 (yielding a Safety Margin of 2.0).

It is assumed that the installer is familiar with mounting using mechanical fasteners to marine structures and has performed structural analysis to assure the structure to which the Seakeeper mounts can properly transfer the loads the Seakeeper creates into the hull structure. If the installer has any doubt about the ability of the structure to transfer the loads to the hull then a licensed naval architect or marine engineer should be contacted to do a structural analysis.

The installer should review the following list of reference drawings to ensure the installation procedure and structural requirements are fully understood.

Reference Documents: