Needs Assessment - roboboatblog.files.wordpress.com · Needs Assessment Team 18 Design and Development of an Autonomous Surface Watercraft AUVSI RoboBoat Members: Donald Gahres –

30 September 2016

Needs Assessment

Team 18

Design and Development of an Autonomous Surface Watercraft

AUVSI RoboBoat

Members:

Donald Gahres – deg12c

Kyle Ladyko – kel14b

Samuel Nauditt – san14d

Teresa Patterson – tap14e

Faculty Advisor:

Dr. Jonathan Clark

Sponsor:

Dr. Damion Dunlap, NSWC-PCD

Instructors:

Dr. Nikhil Gupta

Dr. Chiang Shih

Team 18 Design and Development of an Autonomous Surface Watercraft

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Table of Contents

Table of Figures.......................................................................................................................................... iii

Table of Tables ........................................................................................................................................... iii

ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................................................ iv

1. Introduction ......................................................................................................................................... 1

2. Project Definition ................................................................................................................................ 1

2.1 Background Research ................................................................................................................... 1

2.2 Needs Statement ............................................................................................................................ 2

2.3 Goal Statement and Objectives ..................................................................................................... 3

2.4 Constraints .................................................................................................................................... 3

2.5 Methodology and Scheduling ....................................................................................................... 5

3. Conclusion ........................................................................................................................................... 7

4. References ............................................................................................................................................ 8


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Table of Figures Figure 1: 2016 RoboBoat lake course. ......................................................................................................... 2

Figure 2: Gantt Chart. .................................................................................................................................. 6

Table of Tables Table 1: Weight and Dimension Restrictions. ............................................................................................. 3

Table 2: HOQ. .............................................................................................................................................. 7


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ABSTRACT The AUVSI RoboBoat Competition is an international event that began in 2010 and is held

annually in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Though the rules for the 2010 – 2016 competitions are

posted, the rules for the 2017 competition have not surfaced yet; a teaser video on the

Robonation website states that it will be held in Daytona Beach, FL, and that it will offer new

and exciting challenges to participating teams. Team 18 is the first team at the FAMU-FSU

College of Engineering that has participated in the RoboBoat project, and it also intends to be the

first team to represent the FAMU-FSU COE in the competition by designing, developing, and

testing a vehicle that meets competition requirements posted on the Robonation website. As this

is the first venture into the RoboBoat competition, Team 18 has spent time reviewing similar

projects completed by FAMU-FSU COE students, namely RoboSub, and can utilize these

similarities to determine a preliminary cost, components necessary, and to salvage parts for

continued use. The next steps for the project lead up to an early prototype build to facilitate the

ultimate goal of producing a fully functional, fully autonomous boat that will go on to compete.


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1. Introduction In past senior design years, groups were assigned a similar project known as the RoboSub. This

is the first year that a senior design group will be attempting to design an autonomous watercraft

that operates on the surface of the water, otherwise known as RoboBoat. Attempting the

RoboBoat competition for the first time is ambitious, but the team has clear objectives in order to

deliver a functional prototype. The RoboBoat must autonomously navigate a closed course by

detecting and avoiding buoy obstacles, detect and navigate pinging underwater beacons, launch

and recover an underwater vehicle, and dock itself.

At this point the constraints and tasks for this year’s competition are assumed to be the same as

last year’s competition. If any rules are changed or added, the needs assessment for RoboBoat

will be updated accordingly. The main goal for Team 18 is to accelerate the schedule to allow for

rapid iterations of a working prototype, thus creating the best competition ready craft possible.

Each competition task will be attempted to the best of the team’s ability, although some tasks

may become secondary to allow for better refinement of achievable tasks.

2. Project Definition

2.1 Background Research The AUVSI RoboBoat competition is held annually with university and secondary schools

attending from around the world. The competition rules are generally the same with little

changes made each year1. These rules or tasks include, object detection including various shapes

and colors, tagging a dock with a Velcro patch, ultrasonic navigation, speed trials, and the launch

and recovery of a small autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV). The competition map of the

lake course with outlined tasks can be found below in Figure 1. Past teams have generally been

university engineering organizations or engineering capstone projects similar to the FAMU-FSU

senior design projects. The designs range in complexity and cost, with some teams having

equipment costs upwards of $10, 0001.


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Figure 1: 2016 RoboBoat lake course.

Because FAMU-FSU COE has never attempted the RoboBoat competition before, there are no

previous designs to study. Therefore, it is essential to research the competitors from previous

years in order to determine which designs work best for the present competition. It is most

beneficial to study the boats from previous years in order to iterate and perfect previous designs

into Team 18’s operational RoboBoat. Although already started, it is advantageous to research

the documents and deliverables of previous competitors to determine the best course of action for

our design. This information can include but is not limited to hull design, propulsion, object

detection equipment, neural networking, on-board computing, and power supply. Accessing this

information allows Team 18 to design with a good understanding of what already works, instead

of starting from the ground up.

2.2 Needs Statement The development of an autonomous water vehicle has been used in senior design for many years.

However, the most notable past projects are submersibles such as RoboSub. This project focuses

instead on an above water vehicle and will be made to complete the objectives stated in the

competition rules2. The design of this vehicle will borrow parts and obtain advice from the 2016


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RoboSub Senior Design Team. It will also be borrowing from tried and true models utilized by

other teams and businesses.

“Team 18 needs to create an autonomous boat capable of traversing the RoboBoat competition

course and abides by the rules set by AUVSI and Robonation.”

2.3 Goal Statement and Objectives “Design and optimize an autonomous watercraft so that it is capable of navigating an obstacle

course and completing various tasks set forth by the AUVSI RoboBoat competition.”

Objectives:

Design vehicle.

Purchase or manufacture all components.

Develop prototypes for testing.

Integrate mechatronics of vehicle.

Test mechatronic systems of vehicle.

Test manual control of vehicle.

Test autonomy of vehicle.

Ensure safety at all times.

Compete in the 2017 RoboBoat Competition.

2.4 Constraints Table 1: Weight and Dimension Restrictions.

Constraints for the vehicle are clearly laid out by the AUVSI Foundation within the rules for the

6th

Annual International RoboBoat Competition2. Most importantly are the restrictions for weight

and dimension due to the fact that teams may be disqualified if these are broken. If the team does


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not construct a vehicle that abides by what is given, they will be unable to compete. The team

plans to aim to construct a vehicle that falls within the middle to lower weight restrictions to

capitalize on the point bonus.

Other requirements are listed in the Vehicle Requirements section of the rules and are as follows:

Autonomy: the vehicle must be fully autotonomous and all decisions must be taken

onboard the ASV.

Buoyancy: the vehicle must be positively buoyant and must remain buoyant for at least

30 minutes.

Communication: the vehicle cannot send or receive any control information while in

autonomous mode. Communication is allowed between the vehicle and sub-systems such

as an AUV.

Deployable: the vehicle must have its own 3 or 4 points harness for crane deployment.

Energy Source: the vehicle must use self-contained electrical energy source. Sailboats

are permitted.

Kill Switch: the vehicle must have at least one 1.5in diameter red button located on the

vehicle that, when actuated, must disconnect power from all motors and actuators.

e-Kill Switch: in addition to the physical kill-switch, the vehicle must have at least one

remote kill switch that provides the same functionality.

Payload: the vehicle must have a place to mount a GoPro (or similar) camera.

Payload location: it must have an unobstructed view of the front of the vehicle.

Propulsion: any propulsion system is fine (thruster, paddle, etc.), but moving parts must

have a shroud.

Remote-controllable: the vehicle must be remote-controllable to be brought back to the

dock.

Safety: all sharp, pointy, moving or sensitive parts must be covered and marked.

Size: the vehicle must fit within a six feet, by three feet, by three feet "box".

Surface: the vehicle must float or use ground effect of the water. Mostly

submerged/flying vehicles are forbidden.

Towable: the vehicle must have a tow harness installed at all times.

Waterproof: the vehicle must be rain/splash resistant.

Weight: the vehicle must be 140 lbs. or less.

Interference

o Any vehicle entangled in, dragging, pushing or damaging competition elements or

the landscape is interfering.

o Any vehicle leave its assigned course is interfering.

o Interference will result in a run termination or disqualification, at the judge’s

discretion.


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2.5 Methodology and Scheduling To maximize team efficiency, it was decided to hold team meetings at least once each week

while keeping regular correspondence through email, text, or group messaging. After attending a

conference call with the team sponsor, Damion Dunlap, and meeting with the faculty advisor, Dr.

Clark, the team also decided to check in with Damion every two weeks and Dr. Clark every

week. These meetings are chronicled and the minutes are made available to the whole team the

night following the meeting.

After speaking with Dr. Clark, it was decided that the team would create a schedule that allowed

for the construction of a prototype that can be iterated early in the Fall 2016 semester. This will

ensure that the Spring 2017 semester will progress smoothly when the team proceeds with the

build for the competition. To maximize the use of time, a Gantt chart was created with some

loose estimates for the rest of the Fall 2016 semester. The team expects to follow it as closely as

possible for self-imposed design deadlines, but deadlines for the deliverables laid out by the

syllabus are concrete. The Gantt chart does not show following meetings with either Damion

Dunlap or Dr. Clark, as it is focusing on milestones and these meetings are to be set as a

recurring event. The chart also includes time allotted to construct PowerPoints, documents,

webpages, and posters for the milestones listed in bold in the line for that activity rather than

creating a row of sub-activities.


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Figure 2: Gantt Chart.


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To identify the most important subsystems of the project as a whole, a House of Quality (HOQ)

was constructed so that the base characteristics could be weighted numerically. This is seen in

Table 2. The HOQ indicates that thrust, the frame or hull, and the weight of the vehicle are the

most important qualities, which are in line with the restrictions given by AUVSI.

Table 2: HOQ.

3. Conclusion Due to the nature of the project, Team 18 had to do thorough research on boats as well as AUV,

ROV, and other unmanned systems to better serve in addressing the problem provided. Because

the tasks laid out for the RoboBoat to accomplish are detailed, it enabled the team to proceed

with investigating them – most importantly the design of the boat, how to make it autonomous,

and how to proceed with image tracking. As the rules for the 2017 competition are not available

yet, the team decided to comb through all six rule sets for the 2010 – 2016 competitions to best

prepare for the task at hand.

Team 18 plans to speak with last year’s Team 23 to learn more about the RoboSub that was built

and iterated upon. Any parts that can be scavenged for use on RoboBoat will be, and Team 18

hopes to have a functioning prototype in the water by the middle of October.

Customer

Requirements

Customer

ImportanceDimensions Buoyancy Weight Material Thrust Sensors Frame/Hull

Electronics

Housing

Cost 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5

Size 4 5 3 5 5 4

Durability 2 5 3 3

Maneuverability 5 3 2 5 5 5 5

Safety 5 4 5 3 5

60 47 70 55 95 50 87 56

11.5% 9.0% 13.5% 10.6% 18.3% 9.6% 16.7% 10.8%

4 8 3 6 1 7 2 5

Engineering Characteristics

Ʃ (CI x EC)

Relative Weight

Ranking


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4. References

[1] “RoboBoat” AUVSI Foundation. Web. 30 Sept. 2016.

< http://www.auvsifoundation.org/foundation/competitions/roboboat >

[2] “The 2016 Final Rules and Task Descriptions”. AUVSI Foundation. Web. 28 Sept. 2016.

< https://s3.amazonaws.com/com.felixpageau.roboboat/RoboBoat+2016+Final+Rules.pdf >

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