Inspection Features Added to PropCad Premium
It is common practice to inspect marine propellers to ensure the manufactured product meets the thickness and pitch specified by the design. PropCad Premium now introduces a tool for propeller builders and manufacturers - Inspection Maps, which allows users to create customized layout templates for measuring blade coordinates, blade thickness and local pitch.
HydroComp’s Inspection Maps is a tool to aid in the measurement and inspection of marine propellers during the manufacturing process. These maps provide guidance for propeller craftsman and foundry workers, allowing them to quickly identify the inspection points on the blade and ensure appropriate thickness and local pitch values.
PropCad includes four inspection maps for determining inspection point location and inspection values for thickness and local pitch. These maps produce a template of the developed blade outline, which can often be directly laid on top of constant pitch propellers to approximate the inspection point position. Alternatively, the location maps can provide the exact location in 3D space. The inspection maps that are now featured in PropCad Premium are:
- Thickness map – This template provides the local thickness values of the blade at each inspection point. The maximum thickness is also identified and labeled separately.
- Local pitch map – This template provides the measured value of local pitch for a segment of the blade surface at each inspection point.
- XYZ location map – This templates provides the coordinates of the inspection points in a Cartesian coordinate system. Each inspection point has an X value representing the axial height of the blade at a specified Y and Z ordinate from the shaft axis.
- X-R-Theta location map - This templates provides the coordinates of the inspection points in a cylindrical coordinate system. Each inspection point has an X value representing the axial height of the blade at a specified radius (R) and angle (Theta) from the shaft axis.