An advanced technology team uses powerful IBM
3D technology to
unlock the mysteries of the past In 1932, after rusting in
a public park for more than two decades, the
U.S.S. Holland was cut
up for scrap, a sad and ignoble end for the vessel hailed
as the first modern submarine. Beyond sentiment,
however, the
Holland’s unseemly demise was a historical tragedy. With the
ship destroyed and most of the plans used
to build it scattered and
lost, researchers long believed that the opportunity to
study the innovative genius of the submarine
and its inventor, John
P. Holland, had disappeared forever. Seventy years later,
however, thanks to the patient historical
spadework of a devoted
amateur historian and the magic of 3D digital design tools
from IBM and Dassault Systemes, the Holland
has come back to life
in virtual reality. The result is a fascinating journey into
the emerging field of virtual archaeology
and the opportunity for
modern researchers and history buffs to walk the digital
decks of the Holland for the very first time.
Reconstructing
History The rebirth of the U.S.S. Holland dates to 1992 when
engineer Gary McCue began looking for a way
to train submarine
designers in the use of computer-aided design software.
Details about most modern subs, owned by the
world’s navies, are
classified. He therefore chose the Holland because
whatever data he could find would be in the
public domain and
because it was small enough to be modeled completely. What
began as a simple project grew over the years
into something of an
obsession for some of the world’s most talented
shipbuilding engineers. Like the boat itself,
most of the data used
to build the U.S.S. Holland had been scattered and lost.
Bits and pieces were unearthed in the National
Archives in College
Park, Md., the Library of Congress, the Paterson (N.J.)
Museum in Holland’s adopted hometown, and
the U.S. Submarine Museum
in Groton, Conn. Clues also were found in
newspaper articles, letters, antique catalogs
and the archives of
General Dynamics Electric Boat, descendant of the company
that built the Holland VI and still one of
the leading builders of
submarines for the U.S. Navy. (The Holland VI was later sold
to the U.S. Navy and commissioned as the U.S.S.
Holland.) Virtual
Archeology As each new detail was discovered, it was
loaded into IBM’s PLM computer-aided design
system powered by
CATIA, DELMIA and ENOVIA software developed by IBM
partner, Dassault Systemes. Using CATIA’s
powerful 3D digital
mock-up functions, researchers were able to reconstruct the
entire sub’s design and layout on their computer
screens. These
engineers used animation and systems simulations to make
all key onboard systems operate in virtual
space. With the power of
the CATIA product design application, the time and
motion of torpedo launching, diving, navigating,
electric/gas
propulsion and other systems could be demonstrated,
manipulated and analyzed in every way imaginable.
The greatest
achievement of rebuilding the submarine in this virtual 3D
environment is that now almost all operations
and maintenance of
the submarine can be simulated in real time. What results
is a greater appreciation for design and production
insights of
John Holland and why the US Navy selected the U.S.S Holland
as their first operational submarine. Holland’s
original blueprints
included 90 as-built drawings. But only three survive in the
National Archives - those for general arrangement,
piping and the
propeller. Beginning with this base, the system was able to
create a 3D reference model that established
critical profiles,
dimensions and relative positions for on-board machinery. By
constantly iterating between the 2D historical
documents unearthed
over time and the slowly emerging 3D models, new
information was validated and incorporated.
The CATIA software can
take a series of distinct parts and use constraints and
relationship modeling to simulate their operation.
This was done in
constructing a 3D model of the two-cylinder Otto engine
used to power the boat while on the surface.
The Otto had
approximately 160 parts, and McCue was able to reconstruct the
entire engine by positioning parts some
drawn from antique Otto
catalogs within the context of the engine model.
Inter-part constraints like surface contact,
offset and parallelism
were used to capture design intent by formalizing how parts
relate to one another. Faithful modeling and
step-by-step
assembly-in-context eventually created a system that moved and
operated as one, giving us a window back in
time to “watch” one of
the first industrial gas engines ever built in simulated
operation. Kinematics a science that
performs analysis by
combining time and motion also was used to better understand
how key systems behaved and how the crew operated
them. The main
hatch is a good example. It was a simple hinged lid
with a double-action lever and a compensating
spring. Kinematics
studies achieved using the design software revealed that
Holland designed a lever-action ‘dog bone’
yoke that doubles as a
handle and a locking mechanism, ensuring the hatch is
properly sealed and locked. Such a feature
illustrating Holland’s
devotion even to small details -- would have gone
unnoticed without kinematics. Another feature
of CATIA is
photorealism the ability to accurately render the affect of
lighting on operations. Lighting analysis
clearly illustrates how
stark the Holland’s interior was. Simple globe diffusers used
throughout the sub resulted in stark, high-contrast
lighting
casting long, dense shadows. These shadows would have made it
difficult, at best, to read the instruments.
The numerous valves
used to operate the torpedo tube and Dynamite Gun, for
example, had to be operated in a particular
sequence. Photorealism
illustrates that performing this complex procedure with
the available lighting must have been a dangerous
challenge. In
all, 2,200 parts (not including rivets or batteries) have now
been modeled in CATIA, allowing detailed examination
of most of the
boat’s major systems. Users can “walk through” the
ship, experience its operation, and witness
first hand the genius
of John Holland, the simple schoolteacher from County Clare,
Ireland, who helped to change the course of
naval history. Holland
died in August 1914 without any of his boats ever having
seen battle. Today, however, his genius lives
again in the digital
3D world, where thanks to technology from IBM and
Dassault Systèmes, the U.S.S. Holland
sails the virtual seas. While
the Holland Project looked back one hundred years, the
tools, and methods used in this digital mockup
of naval history
predicts the way future generations of submarines will be
design and built.