Concept model · not a deployed vessel

Fauna-first sargassum harvester

A working 3D model of a concept vessel designed to steer around fresh, living rafts, harvest only senescent mats, clear animals ahead of its intake and return anything that rides aboard to the sea alive. Run it, slow it down, X-ray the hulls or fly the camera to any of the ten stages.

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Live model run

Counted from the objects moving through the model above, not from field data.

wet weed collected: —
animals returned alive: —
fresh rafts skipped: —
diverter gate: —

fresh raft, steered around senescent mat, harvested
Animals drawn at 5× size so you can follow them. Everything else is 1:1 in metres.

Stages (click to focus)

Principal dimensions

Length: 26 m (30 m with boom)
Beam: 10 m, twin 1.8 m hulls
Draft: 1.2 m
Intake: 6 m channel, lip 0.2 to 0.5 m
Slat belt: 9.3 m at 15.5°, 20 mm holes
Trommel: Ø1.2 × 3 m, 3 to 5 rpm
Tunnel: 2 m, 4 cameras, polarized light
Flume: Gravity, exits port-aft below surface
Harvest speed: 1 to 2 kn

Drag to orbit; Ctrl or ⌘ with the scroll wheel, or a pinch, zooms; double-click resets the view. With the model focused, the arrow keys orbit, + and − zoom and Home resets. Print and CAD files are not published on this page.

How a run works

Avoid

Look-ahead sensing (stage 1) spots fresh, golden rafts early so the vessel steers around them; the fresh-rafts-skipped counter ticks as each one passes the bow. The eDNA intake (2) samples the water for animal DNA on the way.

Clear and lift

The evacuation array (3) moves animals off with a shadow curtain, a bubble curtain and transducers before the skimmer intake (4) and slat belt (5) lift the mat. The belt is rigid perforated slats, not mesh, so small animals drop through to the collection pan.

Separate and return

The wash bar (6) and trommel (7) shake riders loose; the vision tunnel (8) spots what is left and swings the diverter gate. Everything separated rides the gravity return flume (9) back to the sea below the surface. Only weed reaches dewatering and the hold (10).

This is a design model, not a deployed system. The counters tally what moves through the animation (clumps reaching the hold, animals leaving the flume, rafts passing the bow); they are not field results.