NDLI: Traction properties of the wheels of an underwater crawler on different soils

Content Provider	IEEE Xplore Digital Library
Author	Waldmann, C. Richter, L.
Copyright Year	2007
Description	Author affiliation: Florida Inst. of Technol., Melbourne (Waldmann, C.)
Abstract	Crawlers are specialized vehicles that allow for underwater intervention by staying in direct contact with the seafloor. These are completely different operating conditions as compared to free flying underwater vehicles. In particular one can expect from this vehicle concept that it offers a very stable platform for conducting delicate measurements at the interface of seafloor and the water column. Additionally, crawlers lend themselves to long term observations with passive phases where the system can go into sleep mode. In space sciences crawlers are already well established platforms ("planetary rovers") and have successfully proven their capabilities in several missions to the Moon and to Mars. For ocean sciences there are still a number of technical problems that have to be solved before a widespread use of these types of platforms can be expected. The attractive properties of crawler systems led to several attempts in the development of wheeled or tracked vehicles. However, it is still an open discussion which type is better suited for underwater applications. The reason why in the case reported here a decision has been made in favor of a wheel driven system mainly goes back to the fact that wheeled system can be designed to be more energy efficient. This is of particular importance for this crawler system as it is supposed to operate autonomously in deep waters, with a fixed energy supply per deployment. As the sediment properties in most parts of the world oceans are unknown a model has to be developed of how to predict the performance of crawler systems under different conditions and adjust the weight in water accordingly or select the right type of wheels. This implies a good knowledge of the traction properties of the individual wheel design. As part of the bi-national funded project MOVE! (Moving Lander) we conducted a number of laboratory tests which were used to firm up the wheel design and predict the performance. But during the last field tests some unforeseen problems with the traction of the wheels showed up. It appeared that the traction has been less than expected in the environment encountered and the wheel had a tendency for digging in although from the sinkage of the wheel and visual observations this should not have been the case. Therefore a set of field tests on different soils in a shallow water environment have been designed and carried out. The objective was to gain more insight into the interaction of an individual wheel with different soil types to be able to come up with an improved model based on a more reliable data set. To have better control on the conditions where the experiment has been carried out a single wheel test set-up has been designed and realised. In particular it is important to control the attitude and the load on the wheel under test. By combining the measurement of the sinkage of the wheel, the pull force, the rotation rate and the translational speed with the electrical parameters of the motors all relevant input parameters for a subsequent modelling activity are at hand. In regard to the soil properties documentation a shear vane device has been used. The set-up proved to be most valuable for the envisaged goal. Employing the wheel performance model that has been developed at DLR in the context of Mars rovers an optimised concept for the operation of the underwater crawler will be presented.
Starting Page	1
Ending Page	7
File Size	4989634
Page Count	7
File Format	PDF
ISBN	9780933957350
DOI	10.1109/OCEANS.2007.4449354
Language	English
Publisher	Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
Publisher Date	2007-09-29
Publisher Place	Canada
Access Restriction	Subscribed
Rights Holder	MTS
Subject Keyword	Wheels Crawlers Testing Underwater vehicles Sea floor Sea measurements Soil measurements Mars Oceans Force measurement
Content Type	Text
Resource Type	Article

Sl.	Authority	Responsibilities	Communication Details
1	Ministry of Education (GoI), Department of Higher Education	Sanctioning Authority	https://www.education.gov.in/ict-initiatives
2	Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur	Host Institute of the Project: The host institute of the project is responsible for providing infrastructure support and hosting the project	https://www.iitkgp.ac.in
3	National Digital Library of India Office, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur	The administrative and infrastructural headquarters of the project	Dr. B. Sutradhar bsutra@ndl.gov.in
4	Project PI / Joint PI	Principal Investigator and Joint Principal Investigators of the project	Dr. B. Sutradhar bsutra@ndl.gov.in Prof. Saswat Chakrabarti will be added soon
5	Website/Portal (Helpdesk)	Queries regarding NDLI and its services	support@ndl.gov.in
6	Contents and Copyright Issues	Queries related to content curation and copyright issues	content@ndl.gov.in
7	National Digital Library of India Club (NDLI Club)	Queries related to NDLI Club formation, support, user awareness program, seminar/symposium, collaboration, social media, promotion, and outreach	clubsupport@ndl.gov.in
8	Digital Preservation Centre (DPC)	Assistance with digitizing and archiving copyright-free printed books	dpc@ndl.gov.in
9	IDR Setup or Support	Queries related to establishment and support of Institutional Digital Repository (IDR) and IDR workshops	idr@ndl.gov.in

The Development and Ocean Testing of an AUV Docking Station for a 21" AUV

MOVE! - An instrument carrier system for spatial observation and time series measurements

Acoustic characterization of the Odyssey II autonomous underwater vehicles

Estimating the vertical velocity of buoyant deep-sea hydrothermal plumes through dynamic analysis of an autonomous vehicle

Minicone penetration testing of seafloor soils

Remote environmental measuring units

Recent trends in underwater in-situ soil testing

CMOVE- a versatile underwater vehicle for seafloor studies

Developments in underwater technologies — Indian scenario

Traction properties of the wheels of an underwater crawler on different soils

Similar Documents

The Development and Ocean Testing of an AUV Docking Station for a 21" AUV

MOVE! - An instrument carrier system for spatial observation and time series measurements

Acoustic characterization of the Odyssey II autonomous underwater vehicles

Estimating the vertical velocity of buoyant deep-sea hydrothermal plumes through dynamic analysis of an autonomous vehicle

Minicone penetration testing of seafloor soils

Remote environmental measuring units

Recent trends in underwater in-situ soil testing

CMOVE- a versatile underwater vehicle for seafloor studies

Developments in underwater technologies — Indian scenario

Traction properties of the wheels of an underwater crawler on different soils