DigitROV, basic design

[duncan]

Mocked up my overall design plan using tinkercad.com:





It's basically in layers and modules.

Top layer: floatation of some sort with 'vents' for the two vertical thrusters.

Second layer: 4 horizontal thrusters, with control box down the center

Third layer: Camera housing, two lights and Battery housing

Then skids that I can attach weights to on the bottom.

I'm hoping to keep the controls, camera, lights and battery separate so they're easier to modify and also easier to replace the battery during long dives. I know this will be a bit of extra work making the connections but I think it will be worth it

Any criticisms would be greatly welcomed!

[ROVER3D]

the first thing: how to you think you will get it out of the water at a landing-stage 1feet over water-line? how you want to handle it?

why you use a seperate cam-housing and not the centerhousing?

[rossrov]

Looking beyond the drawing appears well thought-out, and balanced with respect to thrust and drag. Separate compartments worth the extra work I think. Only thing I would reconsider are the potentially snaggable skids. See this alot on the forum. Why?? Good for helicopters, not ROVs. 90 degree elbows much better.

[duncan]

the first thing: how to you think you will get it out of the water at a landing-stage 1feet over water-line? how you want to handle it?

why you use a seperate cam-housing and not the centerhousing?

Thanks for the comments guys

I dont entirely understand your first question rover3d but I'll give it an attempt. I'm hoping I can get a chinese finger on the umbilical and attach it to the top/rear of the floatation so I can just oull on the umbilical. I can add handles etc that I could grab with a boat hook if necessary onto the floatation also.

Firstly I wanted to move the camera either above or below the two front thrusters so hopefully there is less disturbance in the picture. This would leave a big space in the center of the rov (I could put the batteries there but they'd be difficult to access and may make the rov top heavy depending on the weight of the batteries.

Anyhoo if it's separate I can move it if necessary, or possibly even attach it to a pan/tilt mechanism. Easily swapping out cameras would be an advantage in the future too. Also, I want to go quite deep so (I think?? smaller housings have less chance of collapsing

Ross: I drew it like that because it looks a bit more appealing I guess. I haven't really decided on how they will really look and will depend on the materials I use.

That said, I was looking at the seabotix ROVs earlier and quite like the style they have:

[a_shorething]

I like the general idea.

I'm going modular too. I figure it's better to start out knowing there will be changes and anticipate them than try to come up with a 'perfect' design in the beginning only to end up painting yourself into a corner.

Personally I can think of a lot of design errors the guys over at OPENROV did wrong early on that they're paying for now and one of them is building such a small and limiting framework with very specific design limits. It seems to be working OK at building a 'following' but this (and a few other things) are really holding them back from making progress in my mind.

Modular and simple. Two things that you never regret if you're planning to learn something and have future upgrades.

[duncan]

This is true. Also for deeper depths I may fill the main control box with oil and have to do something different with the camera, so having them separate now will make that easier in the future

[FJM]

I'll echo the thoughts on being modular. Big thumbs up there!

I'd suggest you extend the PVC frame to surround the floatation. I'm not sure how you intend to secure the legs to the floatation, but having the frame as a standalone support might be stronger and allow you to adjust how much floatation you need. As it is, you are tying your floatation and support together, which goes against the modularity. This would also give you a structure on which to mount a handle or hook onto.

I have a separate camera housing as well, but it will be clear and will mount it at 90 degrees to the main housing. I'll put a servo to tilt the camera up to look at the surface or down to look at the bottom.

Fred

[FJM]

Two more thoughts:

Any dimensions or tube thickness? My frame is looking at about a foot cube of 1/2" PVC, with 3" tube for the main enclosure. Not sure what size I need for the camera enclosure yet.

You should also add cross bars across the front and back at the bottom to hold the skids together.

Fred

[duncan]

That all makes sense, Fred.

Tbh I haven't decided if I'll use PVC or knock it all up using sheet metal. This is more a trial run for a much deeper ROV so might just use PVC for now so will definitely take your comments on board

I don't have a camrera/thrusters yet, which will decide on the overall size and dimensions I reckon