GL Launches Tool for Thickness Measurement

The new software tool GL Pegasus to improve material thickness measurements for ships has been presented by Germanischer Lloyd today. GL Pegasus enables direct electronic measurement input. Through this, the software tool significantly reduces the reporting time and the occurrence of human error. Thickness measurement is typically performed by independent measurement firms. The results are a vital part of the assessment of the ship's condition such as corrosion monitoring - for both the ship-owner and the classification society. As the "traditional" thickness measurement process is basically manual it can take several weeks. Also the reporting can take as long as measurement.

With GL Pegasus, based on a 3D structural model of the ship for hull condition monitoring, this process is improved: Manual drawings during measurement are substituted by automatically transferring the thickness measurement data from the measuring device into the 3D model in GL Pegasus. The measurement task itself remains unchanged. Reporting is done automatically: GL Pegasus produces IACS compliant reports and visualizes the results in the 3D model. This facilitates assessment of the condition of a ship's entire structure and its evolution over time as well as supporting corrosion predictions and risk maintenance.

Via Germanischer Lloyd's fleet management tool "fleet online", shipowners have electronic access to the measurement results of their vessels and can use the GL Pegasus Viewer to examine them in the corresponding 3D ship models.

Main Features of GL Pegasus GL Pegasus supports all structural parts of a ship such as plates, profiles, girders, and brackets that are relevant for thickness measurements. The interconnected tabular and graphical views (2D and 3D) facilitate data input and visualisation. The program supports different individual measurement procedures, e.g. cross section based or strake based. Hotspots are easily identified by colouring schemes according to the degree of corrosion in both tabular and graphical views. GL Pegasus can be used for any type of ship.