The HydroSweep DS is a deep water multibeam echosounder ideally suited for seabed mapping in deep water up to full ocean depth based on a sonar frequency between 14 kHz to 16 kHz. Beside bathymetric dept information from 10 m to more than 11,000 m, sidescan data and backscatter data for seabed classification are acquired. The HydroSweep DS does not only gather sea floor information, but also uses adaptive bottom tracking windows to identify sonar targets in the water column. The HydroSweep DS is available with 0.5°x1°, 1°x1°, 1°x2° and 2°x2° beam resolution. All transducers are planar arrays designed to be flush mounted, within a
fairing or in a gondola construction whereas approx. 25% less mounting space is required compared with multibeam echosounders working at lower frequencies such as 12 kHz.
Effects of severe ship motion to survey data are compensated by active beam steering as well as additional multi-ping ensonification. The HydroSweep DS applies 2x multi-pings, which means that two swaths are transmitted simultaneously per ping slightly tilted along track. This results in gapless surveying at higher ship’s speed. Acoustic footprints can be arranged in either “equalangle“ or equal-distant” pattern. A High Order
Beamforming bottom detection algorithm is used to achieve up to 960 soundings per ping with the best possible accuracy in order to meet IHO SP44 accuracy standards.
