Houlder joined forces with National Instruments (NI) and Industrial Systems & Control (ISC) Ltd for Offshore Europe 2015, Aberdeen’s leading oil & gas exhibition last month. The companies share a success story that showcases how off-the-shelf technology and innovative controls engineering accelerates development of offshore handling equipment.

Hosted by National Instruments, ISC and Houlder personnel presented their control system track records. Specifically, the control of pile installation equipment for offshore construction projects. Houlder and ISC successfully Lloyd’s Register certified off-the-shelf hardware, stating that “The combination of LabVIEW (software) and CompactRIO delivered the computational power required for our low-level control and kinematic calculations, as well as the determinism and reliability required for our safety-critical operational logic.”

Since 1976, National Instruments has equipped engineers and scientists with tools that accelerate productivity, innovation and discovery. NI is a global organisation, with offices in more than 40 countries and annual revenue in excess of $1 billion from more than 35,000 companies. ISC has been a leading industrial control consultancy for over 20 years, providing the following services consultancy, training and software. As a wholly independent engineering company, Houlder led the supply of the pile “gripper” solution for its client on a turnkey basis.

The three companies’ work continues with ISC and National Instruments supplying expertise and experience to other Houlder projects.

Houlder’s presence at Offshore Europe presented a great opportunity for visitors to learn about innovative controls engineering and the accurate marine equipment it delivers.