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Open Ocean - Water Velocity Profiles
[II-C1]
I want to make measurements in the ocean. [change]
My area of interest is the open ocean... [change]
...and involves water velocity profiles. [change]
 SonTek/YSI manufactures an Acoustic Doppler Profiler (ADP)
to collect profiles
of water velocity in the open ocean. For ADPs, there are two basic questions that quickly get us to the most appropriate
system:
- What profiling range is required?
The ADP is available in five frequencies, with nominal ranges of 6, 25, 40, 90, and 160 m. These are the expected "medium" ranges under typical conditions. In some
cases the range will be less, in others more.
- How is the ADP to be deployed (e.g., on the bottom, on a mooring, from a boat)?
If the ADP is to be deployed on the bottom, or in a fixed location, then a compass/tilt
sensor might prove a useful addition for installation, and also for later analysis to see
if the package has moved. If the ADP is to be deployed on a mooring, then a compass/tilt
is essential for proper vector averaging. If it is to be deployed from a moving platform
(e.g., a boat), then we need to account for the motion of the platform whether through the
use of a DGPS system or our bottom-tracking feature (or both).
There is a complete suite of Windows-based software for the ADPs, including
post-processing and three different application-specific data acquisition programs.
Any ADP can be configured for
real-time monitoring or for autonomous deployments with on-board logging and power. Also,
these systems can be configured with a variety of external sensors, including pressure,
conductivity, temperature, turbidity, etc.
In addition, ADPs equipped with pressure sensors can be configured with software that
calculates wave statistics such as significant wave height and peak period.
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