About DSA
The ocean is a harsh environment. DSA provides engineering analysis and simulation services to reduce risk in marine, offshore, and subsea industries. In addition to consulting services, DSA uses its expertise to create marine engineering software that tackles tough ocean engineering problems.
DSA’s core expertise is the ability to assess the dynamics of systems that contain flexible or articulated components such as moorings, risers, nets, cables, or cranes. Applications might include an offshore mooring system, an ROV with umbilical, a fish farm, or a launch and recovery system. DSA has worked in industries including marine renewable energy, aquaculture, offshore oil and gas, defence, and subsea industries to improve designs through comprehensive analysis and simulation.
The following white paper contains a brief overview of DSA and its capabilities. If you are interested in learning how DSA might assist your business, feel free to call us or send us an email at info@dsa-ltd.ca.
Download the DSA 2012 White Paper
History
DSA was created in 2006 by Dean Steinke and Ryan Nicoll as a spin-off company from the University of Victoria in Victoria, BC, Canada. The company was formed as a consultancy with the aim to commercialize simulation software that had been developed by the co-founders and Dr. Bradley Buckham in the Subsea Robotics Lab at the University. DSA has offices in Halifax, NS and Victoria, BC and works with clients and partners worldwide.
Applications and expertise
DSA has a wide range of experience and in-house expertise. Many of DSA’s projects utilize DSA’s multi-body time domain simulation platform called ProteusDS®. ProteusDS is capable of simulating mooring systems, such those used in aquaculture sites or offshore platforms. It is also capable of analyzing complex robotic devices such as wave-energy converters or ship borne cranes used in marine operations. Simulations completed with the help of ProteusDS reduce risk to projects by providing realistic engineering prototypes that can be tested at a fraction of the cost of physical test-basin prototypes.
Mechanical design and analysis of marine structures
- Design of marine structures and mooring systems
- Design optimization
- 3D CAD
Tidal and wave energy converter design
- System and mechanical design
- Dynamics and controller design
- Mooring analysis
- Wave farm analysis
- Tidal energy converter installation analysis
- Safety and operations assessments
- Hydrodynamic modeling
Aquaculture engineering
- Mooring assessment and design
- Mooring load measurement and analysis
- Net simulation and prediction
- Shellfish raft mechanical design
Mooring analysis
- Mooring design and analysis services
- Time-domain simulation
- Wave and tidal energy converter mooring assessment
- Fatigue analysis
Ship crane and winch analysis
- Analysis of winch performance
- Analysis of operability of cranes and winches at sea
- Heave compensation and constant tension winch analysis
Salvage support
- Operations simulation and analysis
- Rendered 3D visualization
Regulatory assessment
- Compliance with international codes (DNV, ABS, API)
Pipeline and riser analysis
- FEA analysis of pipeline systems
- FEA analysis of riser system
- Model based filtering and control
Robotic systems analysis
- Model based filtering and control
- ROV and towed body PID controller design
- ROV navigation algorithm design