Study of guiding effect along the cargo hull of a ship by measurements and simulations

The guiding of electromagnetic waves along the cargo hull is studied and presented in this paper. Wideband channel sounding in UHF band between the bridge room and the cargo hull onboard a vessel has been conducted. Based on the periodicity of the arrival time between the multipath signals, possible analogous waveguide effect along the cargo hull is deduced. The relationship between the periodicity, the center frequency and the receiver position is then analyzed in detail. The period of signal arrival is independent of both the center frequency and the receiver position. The mean period of the signal arrival is found to correspond to the width of the cargo hull. The conclusions drawn from measurement results are validated using 3-D ray tracing simulation results. The research is useful for long distance communication aboard a metallic ship vessel for military applications.