18 - Sunday, August 12, 1990 - North Shore News BUSINESS NV company lighting way to marine profits Michael Becker HIGH TECH A NORTH Vancouver marine lighting and manoeuvring systems com- pany is riding the crest of new technological develop- ments in its respective areas of expertise. Jastram Technologies Ltd., launched by engineer and com- pany president Peter Doetsch in 1983, lit up on the lighting side of the operation when in 1984 it secured the lighting contract for 12 new Frigates being built for the Canadian Navy. Jastram's con- tract is worth more than $10 mil- lion and runs through 1994. As a result of the contract, the company has established an exper- tise in preparing lighting designs for ships. The engine driving Jastram’s lighting know-how is a unique software program designed by the company’s Toronto-based vice-president of engineering, Jim Otar. From technical drawings, ship areas and rooms are created in digital form. Light sources and light distribution properties are shown. The program shows in table form an indication of lighting quantities, total! electric load, total weight and total budget price for an entire vessel. The program was used by Jastram to complete lighting design work for the proposed B.C. superferries. The navy frigate contracts have also resulted in manufacturing spin-offs for the company. Said Jastram’s Doetsch, ‘‘For example they wanted a special strobe light, which we developed in Canada. It fits in with a new department of transport regulation that all law enforcement agencies have to have thsi strobe light. So we are building them here, for the navy, for Canadian Coast Guard, for Customs.”’ The company also builds ballasts for ship-board lighting. Meanwhile, on the manoeuvring systems -side of the venture, Jastram Engineering Ltd. is put- ting much research and develop- ment effort into refining marine hydraulic steering and rudder systems. Last year’s bankruptcy and closure of North Vancouver-based Wagner Engineering, a company from which Jastram had bought steering gears, turned into an unexpected opportunity. Explains Doetsch, ‘*What hap- pened is that we are very heavily involved in marine manocuvring systems. When Wagner folded there was a void for us in terms of supply of steering gears. We didn’t know where to go anymore. So naturally we developed out of that to where we now supply a complete manoeuvring system, the " NEWS photo Mike Waketield JASTRAM PRESIDENT Peter Doetsch shows a model of a West German-designed and patented flap rudder. Jastram holds the licensing rights to the technology for North America. steering gear, the steering controls and the rudder itself. We can give you the whole aft of a ship.”’ Jastram went on to hire key former Wagner Engineering per- sonnel. About 99 per cent of the com- pany’s steering systems work for commercial vessels is export. 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