Barloworld Power has supplied all the power requirements for a high speed aluminium hull vessel that will be used to patrol the Nigerian oilfields off the west coast of Africa and safely transfer crews between the shore and the oil rigs. The 30m vessel, built by KND Projects in Cape Town and 100% Cat powered, is the first of its kind in Africa. It has been designed and built to withstand attacks by pirates, of which there were more than 40 in Nigerian waters in January 2011 alone. The vessel will achieve a maximum speed of 30 knots travelling between the mainland and oil rig platforms up to 100 nautical miles offshore.  Barloworld Power marine customer service rep Anton Hector sold the customer three Cat C32 propulsion engines coupled to ZF3050 gearboxes, as well as two Cat C4.4 gensets.
 
“The Barloworld Power team was involved in this project from the planning stages, including motivating the use of Cat power to the Nigerian client, involvement in design and monitoring of the propulsion system, as well as support for the naval design team involved in the project,” says Anton.
    
Based on its success, Barloworld Power has been awarded the contract for a second vessel and at time of writing (April 2011) the engines were being delivered. A third looks likely to follow.

High speed pic 1

In front of the 100% Cat powered high speed vessel in the Simonstown dockyard are Barloworld Power team members (from left): Anton Hector, marine CSR; Theo Jooste, coastal business unit manager; Richard Laubscher, applications engineer; Albert Zelie, regional sales manager; Johan Eitner, regional service manager; Riaan Rossouw, marine technician; and Carike Swanepoel, sales administrator.

High speed pic 2

The engine room.