Design of a Small, Cheap UUV for Under-Ship Inspection and Salvage

David P. Miller IUPR Reston, VA 22091 Phone: (703) 620-0551. FAX: (703) 860-1802 eniail: k i p 3;src.umd.edu Abstract
Sriiall UTJVshave a wide variety of uses including inspection, instruInent placement, specirrlen gathering arid salvage. However the uses of these UUVs has been limited by t,wo factors:

I o need for real time video

The last three items above are unusual for a, UUV. Alm& all UUVs rilIi a t,et,her back to the surface for sending \-itleo, rcceivirlg commaIlcls, and oftenpower is rim over the tether as well. However, if a task doniain is chosen where real t,ime commands and video are riot needed then the tether can be eliminated. The only challenge that remains is controlling the robot without continuous telemetry. Fortunately. behavioral cont,rol technology [a]has advanccd to the point where autononious cmitrol c;an br added to a UUV. and is sufficient for carrying out many types of nhsions. Behavior control has been iiscd successfully on UUVs before, but in [l] it was used to safe the vehicle from collisions, and in [3] it was used to control a legged bottom crawling vehicle. In [4] behavior control was suggested as part of the overall We are u11architectiirp in a much more complex UUV. aware of any work t.o use behavior coritml to minimize the sizc and cost of a UUV the way it, has becn 11sed to niininiize these factors in other types of explorat,iori S I . robots [ The types of niissions we will address with this systcni are simple inspection of a well defined area, such as tlie hull of a ship, or simple rendezvous with a well drfined target. In both instances, well defined means that tlir target or hull itre readily detectable by the sensors oriboard the vehicle. No attempt is made in this system to keep tra,ck o f the robot's absolute position, or to follow a specific course tluririg the mission. The targetas arid areas of inspection are dc4ried by their visual characteristics: brightnrss arid color. or t,heir contrast to t,he rest, of tlir mvironnient .

UUVs llave heen traditionally quite expensive, puttirig tklerrl well out, of the reach of the traditional marine ogerator. 2. Wires ?r4ost,UUVs trail a cable for power. control, a n d video back to the operator. The cable makes it difficult to use t,he UUV in kelp, or in the presence of net,s or other UUVs.
1. Cost
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This paper describes the design and function of a small (lcss tliari 10kg) arid inexpensive UUV that is given a
mission clesrription and t,hen carries out that niission aiitonorriously. Thc UUV can home in on a beacon. assuring its recovery at the end of t,hr mission. This vehicle can be used for everything from inspecting a fouled propeller to placing a piece of equipment on the ocean floor in tlie middle of a kelp forest.

Introduction UUVs are used for a variet,y of tasks that require a wide range of capabilit,ies. The syst,ems that have been constructed arc t,ypicaIly fairly large' and expensive. In part, t>hisis due to thc large number of capabilities that, are built, into t,hr: vehicles. It, is our belief t,liat a useful UUV could exist. that would have a very 1iniit)ed set of operating capabilities, and that a UUV t,liat met those capabilities could br prodiiced at relat,ively low cost. Thr limits we are scttirig for thc purposes of this papcr are:
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Shallow water (dept,hs of less than 30m) Calm wat,cr (currt.nt,s of lcss than 2 knots) Clearly defined mission goals

0
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The Vehicle
is 44 5cm in length has a riiclximum tliamcter of 12cni and displaces 3.81 of water. Like all of KIPR's robots, tlir use of off the shelf parts

Low cost
No ntwl for real time c~onimancis

Our x-eliitlr DRIP'

' while rriosl TJVVs arc srriall when compared to st,aridard submersibles. they are larger and certainly heavier than
most mobile roboh.

0-7803-3 185-0/96$5.0001996 IEEE

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are rnaxirnixd to incrc reliability and reduce cost (sec, [5,7]). The hull of DRIP is constriic 1 from PVC sewer pipc antl a 12v divr light. The resulting structure is shown in Figure 1. This combination of parts allows milch of the hull to hc disassembled for cleaning arid niaintenance. The dive light casing allows easy access to tht: electronics antl batteries through the uriscrewable lcxan hexti1 at, the front. The three posit,ion switch from t,hr light has h t w i utilized to act as a main power antl corriputw reset, switch. The clear lexan front allows thc seiisors to have a clear view of the environment.

Figure 2: DRIP'S Propiilsion Pump

Figiire 1: The DRIP UTJV

The propulsion arid steering systcm is provided by a set of rnodel airplane refueling piimps. shown in Figure 2 . These in-line, reversible pimps are used to move the vchicle forwards arid hckwards, as well as controlling yaw. Pitc4i is cont,rollecl hy c~hitriging thc: CG. A wciglit is niovt:tl along the insitlc of the vehicle by a nioti.)r arid ball scrccw arrangcmcnt. The vehicle is weightcd to be rieutrally biwyant (a very sliglit, positive buoyancy is niairitaiwd) . Depth is cont,rolled by altcring pitch antl thrust,iiig forwarcl or in rcversc. Approximat,cd hovering ('anbe maint,ained by riiaint,aining a slight pitacharid tliriistirig forward and hack its needed. Power is supplicd 1)y four st,antlard 1.5aH-7.2~ nicad hatt,ery packs. Thr. niotors ire operat,t:d at approximat>ely14 voks. Tlic power for t he electronics is regiilated at 12 volts. On-board coniputation is siipplietl by a Vwta 68332 or hoard (Figiu-e 3) running tlie ARC real-time operating systcrn. Tlic proccssor corit,rols t hc. piimps and motors through a relay board. Spwd control of the motors has not t ) c m i inipleriierited. However speed of t,hc veliirlc ran (witrolled by tlw n i i r r i k r o f piinips that, have htwi m g a g d .
h ( 3

fudihfd-

Figure 3: The Cogiiachrmnr. Color Tracker mounted mh.

The standard sensor suite for DRIP consistJsof an array of photo t,ransist,ors, ancl an IR proxiniity sensor. Additionally, there are several proprioceptive sensors for nionitoring thc intcrnal :stat<,of the robot. A Chinon color video c-aniera (sliown in Figure 4 is included. It,soutput, is fed t,hroiigh a Cog.riachromecolor processing tmartl (se? Figure 3). 'I'hk allows real-time color tracking for finding objects with preset color properties. The color t a l k can aiitornat,icdy be adjiist,ed during the robot's operation t,o handlc t,he changes in cdor ahsorption dur to differing distances between the camera and t,lie ohject heing trackrd.

Current Stat,us and Near-Term Plans

As of this writing, asserribly of DRIP is almost, cornplett. All the7 components have hem individually test,-

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h g s of the 1991 National Conierence on Artificial h t e l iigence. j1.4A1 pgs 794-800, July 1991. [Z] Rodney A. Brooks, A Robust Layered Control System for a Mobile Robot. IEEE Journal on Robotics and Autom,afion. vol R.A-2#1. March 1986. [3] H. Greiner, et.al., Autonomous Legged 1Tnderwakr Vehicles for Near Land Warfare, i n Proceedings of t h ~ untermeasures Sympo-

[4] Shller. D.P.. 6, Slack, M.,G., Design & Testing of a Low-Cost Robotic Wheelchair, in Av,tonmmous Robots, volume 1 #3. 1995.
[ 5 ] Sliller. D.P.. Slack, M.G., & Elsat,sser, C.. Ari Irnplemented Intelligent Agent, Architecture for Autonomous

Submersibles, in the Intelligent Ships Symposium Proceedings: Intelligent Ship Tecfmologiesf o r the 21st Cent w y . June 1994.

Figurc. 4. The color carnera (3.5 floppy in background for sc.alr)

[6] 1,JilIer. D.P.. Ilesai, R.S.; Gat,, E., Ivlev, R., Loc:h. J., Reactive Savigatiori Through Rough Terrain: Experimental Results. in the Proceedings of the I992 National Corifewnce on z4rlzfiicial Intelligence, pp. 823-828, Sari .Jose. CA. July 1992.

ed. Tlic first full-up systcrris tests in tlie vater should take place in the next few wecks. The testing will take place in a. local neutral biioyaricy tank which is fifty feet in diameter and t,wenty-five feet deep. Once t,lie syst,eiii is fully operational; we plan to test DRIP in a vitrict,y of scenarios including: Find the dive light,. In t,his scenario the rohot search cs out a dropped dive light arid rendezvous with it. This is a preludc to a salvage task. Follow the diver. The robot tracks the cdors of a partic:ular divcr and follows them around while avoiding ot,her divers and ol)ject,s. Hide iinder t,lit: boat. In this scrriario; t h r robot stays near but iiritlcr a boat or other platforrii or1 tlic surfacc. This is a prelude t o a hiill inspection t,a.sk . The narts costs of t,lie mrriDIete veliirle are iintlcr $3000. Approxiniat,cly two-t,liirds of that cost goes to the color t,rwkiiig system. If low-cost srnsors ran tir found for iispfiil niissioris, then copies of DRIP coiild
tic reproduced at alrriost disposable prices.

ilstein, <J.: Scarecrow the Robot, in AI dagazin,e. vol 13 #2. R.obotics Cornget,ition Conference Supplement. 1992.

Conclusions
Sonic UUV opcratioris c m tw dorir without c-orit iniioiis opt:rator iritcrxmt,iori. Oricc this asmiliption is niadr, t hc unibilicd that follows alrriost all UUVs can tw cut, frc&ig t h e . UUV. arid eliminating rriiicli of tlir overliead of both t,hr UUV arid its optJrations. i l serriiautonorimus UUV can b c xist,ructed for very low-cost . We hope to prove over thc ricxt scverill rnonths that such a, TJUV will liavtl liigli utility.

References
[I] Irtrr f b o .
1rndrrwater Expt~rirntmts(-sing li ripact,ivcl Systerri for Autoriorrious Vc~h~cles. in the Irocrcil-

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