Ropeless RISER™
When buoys and vertical lines are removed from the water column, so too are the fishermen’s methods of locating and retrieving their catch. Ropeless RISER™ provides an alternative for both of these aspects of trap fishing.
The Buoy, which allows for the location of gear, is replaced by our transponder, which acoustically locates your traps.
The Line, which allows recovery of gear, is replaced by several highly configurable airbag-based retrieval platforms.
The Actuator
When we remove the buoy from the water column, we must replace it with an alternative system for marking and recovering. The actuator is the electronics package we send to the seafloor with your traps. It has communication abilities and facilitates the surfacing of your traps when called upon.
We have two options for actuators; the simple-to-use, “receive only”, RISER-AT and the more robust RISER-MTA which is compatible with our real-time seafloor location system.
RISER-AT
RISER-AT is a compact, very reliable, receive-only acoustic actuator. Receive-only means you can acoustically release the actuator, but it will not reply to the surface.
RISER-AT is paired with a portable battery-powered deck box and over-the-rail surface transducer which can conveniently be brought from vessel to vessel. Simply dangle the transducer into the water when you want to recover the unit and use the included tablet to send the release command to your system.
There is no built-in locating system, so fishermen must rely on manual marking or external gear marking solutions.
RISER-MTA
RISER-MTA shares the same reliable subsea acoustics technology as RISER-AT, while adding many features to streamline ropeless fishing operations. The most notable difference from RISER-AT is the ability to communicate back to the surface vessel. This allows RISER-MTA to take advantage of our real-time seafloor gear location technology.
All deckbox operations have moved to a chart plotter with our integrated Ropeless RISER™ plugin. Integration with the chart plotter allows you to see your traps on the seafloor in read-time, distinguish between single traps and trawls, your gear and other fishers’ gear, and recover your traps at the click of a button.
Additionally, we’ve implemented an air conservation method that allows RISER-MTA to sense when the system has left the seafloor and turn off the air supply. This allows for more deployments on a single air supply.
The Lift Bag
To solve the problem of whale entanglement, we must remove all vertical lines in the water column. The best method of ropeless fishing utilizes an Enclosed Flotation Bag (EFB), also known as a “lift bag”. These bags provide a large lift capacity in a very compact package. They utilize standard compressed air cylinders connected to a valve which is controlled by the actuator. When the system surfaces, the bag can quickly be deflated and reset for its next deployment.
We have several configurations of EFBs, air cylinders, and mounting frames tailored to your needs.
Trap Attached System
Our Trap-Attached System was designed with inshore, and single-trap fishermen in mind. The system is compact enough to be mounted directly to a trap and is configured with enough buoyancy to lift a single trap.
Ground Line Recovery System
Our Ground Line Recovery System is designed to do exactly what the name suggests, recover ground line. This system was designed to be used when fishing in trawls, or when attaching to the trap is not ideal.
Anchor System
Designed with offshore fishermen in mind, our Anchor System can be weighted to replace the anchor typically used at the end of a trawl. This system utilizes a larger air supply and a 500 lb. lift bag to reach the depths required by offshore fishermen.
Highly Configurable
Ropeless RISER™ is modular and can be pieced together to meet your exact fishing needs.
There are three major components of the Ropeless RISER™ seafloor system; the actuator, the air supply, and the lift bag. These can all be attached to a frame of any size depending on your needs.
Custom Configurations
Need something different? Our team of engineers can find a unique solution to meet your goals.
Ropeless RISER™ is highly configurable and most needs can be met by adjusting the size of the air cylinder or lift bag. When a change to form factor is desired our engineers can create something custom just for you. For example, the Canadian Wildlife Federation tasked us with designing a custom ropeless solution for their Snow Crab fishermen. These traps are fished much deeper and weigh much more than traps for which we been designing. There was also a desire to fish these traps as singles, and a consideration that required the opening of the trap to float above the waterline when surfaced. Our solution was a custom frame that hooks directly onto the Snow Crab trap, double cylinders for 160 cubic feet of air, and a toroidal lift bag that is installed internally to the trap and results in the opening of the trap floating above the waterline.