This thesis describes the development of a micromachine model and associated data acquisition system, which is used to study the improvement of the transient response of a ship's diesel generator set following a severe disturbance. The improvement in response is obtained by the use of transient rotor acceleration as a single extra feedback signal into the excitation and governor systems of the micromachine model. The response of the ship system is predicted by theoretical studies, which use a multiprocessor system to implement a Park's two axes, five winding model of the ship's generator together with the associated automatic voltage regulator and diesel governor models. The optimal feedback gains obtained from the theoretical studies are then used to obtain results from the micromachine system, a comparison between the theoretical and experimental results confirms the conclusion that a significant improvement in the system's transient response is obtained. This improvement is maintained when changes are made to the alternator load and the fault duration, without any alterations to the system feedback gains.