Analysis of Thermal Characteristics of MEMS Sensors for Measuring the Rolling Period of Maritime Autonomous Surface Ships

Abstract

Recently, with the emergence of maritime autonomous surface ships (MASS), ensuring seaworthiness has increased with the operation of MASS. Ship stability is important for safety, and technical methods for controlling a ship’s motion are required to evaluate the stability. A ship’s rolling period is estimated using microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) sensors to measure the ship’s metacentric height. However, weather changes (e.g., temperature) are drastic due to various marine environments in the sea. Hence, it is necessary to analyze MEMS sensors’ thermal characteristics for applying them to MASS. This study aims to analyze the thermal characteristics of a siX-axis MEMS sensor for its application in MASS. The experiments analyzed measurement errors and noise at six steps in the range of 25–75 °C in which the MEMS sensor can be operated. The experimental results showed that the gyroscope’s thermal error and MEMS sensor’s noise level were much larger than those of the accelerometer and the respective thermal error values along the Z-axis of the accelerometer and gyroscope were the most stable compared to those along the other axes. The findings can be applied to a measurement method of the stability of MASS employing MEMS sensors in navigation equipment.