Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 November 2009
Modern ship control and navigation systems involve a complex variety of intricately interwoven electronic, electrical, mechanical and hydraulic devices. It has become appropriate therefore to devise a convenient method for representing mathematically the dynamic characteristics of these systems and the elements which comprise them, so that block-diagram modelling can be implemented. This is ideal for displaying the interrelationships of such systems pictorially and has the added advantage of simplicity and of indicating realistically the actual processes which are taking place, as the models refer to the relationship between mathematics and the real world.