Eliminating Steel: A Sensor Buoy Rigging Challenge
Waterproof Marine Consultancy & Services was working for the offshore wind farm Ecowende on a pre, during and post construction ecological monitoring for an offshore-wind farm under construction. The underwater acoustic measurements demanded zero metallic interference, and WaterProof needed to rethink their entire rigging setup.
The Challenge: Eliminating steel components
Our customer faced three interconnected problems with their sensor buoy installations:
Corrosion in saltwater environments - Steel fittings degraded over time, requiring maintenance and creating reliability concerns.
Metal-on-metal noise - Wave action caused steel components to generate acoustic interference, exactly what their sensors were designed to detect.
Compromised data quality - For precise underwater sound measurements, even minimal metallic noise was unacceptable.
The question was straightforward: Could we eliminate steel components entirely?
The Solution:
After a few emails and 2-3 Teams calls, our engineering team in Denmark developed custom connection solutions using high-performance synthetic rope terminations. The rigging system was redesigned from the ground up, replacing every steel fitting with purpose-engineered synthetic alternatives.
Working directly with the technical team from WaterProof Marine Consultancy & Services, we specified rope types, termination methods, and connection hardware that would maintain structural integrity while eliminating all metallic components from the measurement zone.
The Result: Steel free rigging system
The steel-free rigging system delivered on every requirement:
No corrosion - Synthetic components remain unaffected by saltwater
Reduced acoustic noise - Metal-on-metal interference eliminated
Cleaner sensor data - Measurement precision improved significantly
Simplified assembly - Lighter components, easier handling at sea
This wasn't about replacing one component with another - it required engineering dialogue to understand the actual operating conditions and design constraints. WaterProof Marine Consultancy & Services trusted us with the technical challenge, and together we found a solution that worked.
