Low-Cost, Small and Smart Autonomous Underwater Vehicles

Project description

This industry-guided project aims to design and demonstrate production of a low-cost, small and smart Autonomous Underwater Vehicle’s (AUVs) from readily available consumer hardware and fabricated using non-scaled, hobbyist-level machining techniques. These AUV platform demonstrators should be able to have differing configurations due to parts availability and required mission capabilities, where platform modulatory should reflect mission objectives. It is intended that the AUVs utilise open-source software stacks where possible, integrating with systems similar to Mavlink or Ardupilot; or using software owned by Saab. The AUVs must complete several objectives as per the provided vignette in a trusted manner, and demonstrate seaworthiness and capability in an appropriate environment. This project will be divided into two teams, a hardware and a software team that will need to work together to meet this vignette, that will be provided when the project commences. Autonomous Underwater Vehicles hardware Team (2 students) The hardware team will be responsible for design of the hull, control surfaces and systems; and the modular hardware interfaces. This project is intended to have a large focus on leveraging 3D printing technologies and readily-available modular microcontrollers and sensor packages, such as Arduino or Raspberry Pi, to achieve rapid prototyping of a scalable and modular vehicle platform. This project aims to:

• Develop the preliminary AUV prototype hull and hardware interface;
• Develop a modular AUV platform architecture suitable for low-cost development;
• Demonstrate design suitability through analysis of the proposed design with FEA or similar integrity assurance processes;
• Produce several modular AUV platforms from consumer microcontroller and sensor packages; and
• Demonstrate the seaworthiness and capability of the AUVs in an appropriate environment;

This project is ideal for students with interests in Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD), Finite Element Analysis (FEA) and control theory, with future opportunities in post-graduate research in acoustic underwater modelling, signal processing, AI & ML; and trusted autonomous systems. Autonomous Underwater Vehicles Software Team (2 students) The software team is responsible for the autonomous decision support system for the AUVs, the integration into open-source mission systems and the software integration of the different sensor configurations. This project is intended to have a large focus on leveraging open-source software to achieve the highly configurable mission systems. This project aims to:

• Develop the preliminary AUV platform software architecture to be integrated with Mavlink or Ardupilot software;
• Develop a modular AUV software architecture suitable for low-cost sensors and microcontrollers for different configurations;
• Develop a prototype AUV decision support system to complete complex tasks autonomously with human off the loop;
• Demonstrate the seaworthiness and capability of the AUVs in an appropriate environment;

This project is ideal for students with interests in Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD), Finite Element Analysis (FEA) and control theory, with future opportunities in post-graduate research in acoustic underwater modelling, signal processing, AI & ML; and trusted autonomous systems.  

Supervisors research focus

Maritime Autonomy, Underwater Sensors

Industry involvement

SAAB Australia

Note: You need to register interest in projects from different supervisors (not a number of projects with the one supervisor).
You must also contact each supervisor directly to discuss both the project details and your suitability to undertake the project.