New Student Design Competition 2014: myRIO powered UAV Submarine

[Trottmpq]

Contact Information

University:                                                         Cardiff University

Team Members (with year of graduation):    Chris Bentley (2014); Marist Fernando (2014);

                                                                           Edward Lewell (2014); Peter Mercer (2014);

                                                                           Beth Oates (2014); Rowan Phillips (2014);

                                                                           Michael Rees (2014); Nic Roberts (2014);

                                                                           Matthew Trott (2014)

Project Supervisor:                                          Steve Watts, Dr Rhys Pullin, Dr Alastair Clarke

Email Address:                                                 trottmpq@gmail.com

Project Information

Title:                myRIO powered UAV Submarine

Description:   Design and create an unmanned autonomous submarine for the purpose of

                        marine exploration and mapping.

Products:        NI myRIO-1900

                        LabVIEW 2013

                        LabVIEW Real-Time Module

                        LabVIEW for myRIO Module

                        LabVIEW FPGA Module

                        LabVIEW FPGA Xilinx Tools

                        LabVIEW Vision Acquisition Software

                        LabVIEW PID control and Fuzzy Logic Toolkit

                        Pololu High-Power Motor Controller 18v15

                        Seabotix BTD150

                        Sparkfun ITG-3200 Gyroscope

                        Sparkfunb HMG-6352 Compass

                        Logitech Web Camera

                        Solidworks

The Challenge:

                        The Aim of the project was to create a self contained submarine, that could be

                        controlled via a wired tether, with a view to convert the submarine to an

                        autonomous vehicle in future iterations. This would be then used by the marine

                        science department of the university in order to map and characterise the

                        river and ocean floor.

                        To do this the submarine needed to be able to run off its own power supply

                        and be able to give a user visual feedback of any measurements it made. The

                        submarine needed to ensure that it was not susceptible to any drifting that may

                        occur due to currents and be able to hold its stationary position if no direction

                        command is given.

The Solution:

                         The Submarine was controlled via an on shore host device (Laptop) where the

                         user could input directional vectors and receive visual feedback from the web

                         camera on the submarine. The user could then avoid any obstacles that may

                         have been encountered. This was achieved using LabVIEW Network streams

                         to send data to and from the submarine and using the IMAQdx driver set to

                         view the image data from the webcam.

                         The Submarine itself was designed from scratch for this year of the project by the

                         team of mechanical students. The design brief was to create a neutrally buoyant

                         chassis and hull that could contain all the electrical components and battery

                         power supply. This was achieved through multiple design iterations using the

                         CAD software Solidworks and then built to this design.                       

                        
                         In order to reduce the number of moving parts on the submarine and hence

                         reducing the waterproofing requirement of the project, it was decided that a

                         vector thrusting arrangement would be used. This meant having 4 thrusters

                         arranged at 45 degrees to the orientation of the submarine and a single

                         central vertical thruster. This gives the submarine 4 degrees of freedom with

                         complete movement in the XY axis and depth control in the Z axis. To ensure

                         that the thrusters moved the submarine in the desired direction, feedback

                         sensors were used to act as process variables in PID control loops within the

                         LabVIEW Control code on the myRIO. This ensured that any imbalance in

                         the thrusters due to water flow would be accounted for.

                                                          

                         The sensors used were the onboard accelerometer on the myRIO in

                         conjunction with a gyroscope sensor to create feedback for any movement in

                         the XY plane. A compass sensor was also used to gain an indication of the

                         orientation of the submarine and a pressure sensor was used to gain

                         knowledge of the depth that the vehicle had reached.

                         LabVIEW and the myRIO enabled the project to achieve the goals that were

                         set out due to its ease of use. The myRIO tool set made communication to

                         the sensors over I2C simple and the analogue measurements of the pressure

                         gauge straightforward. Using the new Network stream functionality in LabVIEW

                         meant that setting up a high bandwidth connection to the submarine took just

                         a few minutes rather than the confusion of configuring TCP/IP settings that would

                         normally be used.

                         All work on the project was conducted within the academic year starting

                         September 2013 and finishing in April 2014.

Attach Poster

              

                                                                                                              Cardiff e.Sub Poster 1

              

                                                                                                              Cardiff e.Sub Poster 2

                         

                                                                                                         Submarine Main Vi
                         

                                                                                                              Host Main Vi