Skip to main content

Design and Simulation of the Hull of a Small-Sized Autonomous Surface Vehicle for Seabed Mapping

  • Conference paper
  • First Online:

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Mechanical Engineering ((LNME))

Abstract

Autonomous Surface Vehicles are versatile marine vehicles that allow to fulfill a variety of offshore activities. Their versatility has been appreciated by the marine and aquatic science community, in fact, in the last years, a large number of ASVs have been developed in research projects and introduced in the market.

In this paper, the design and simulation of a small-sized ASV for seabed mapping of shallow waters are described. The vehicle is characterized by catamaran shape, low draft, jet-drive propellers that allow its deployment from the shore, and a payload of 20 kg. The design process has been carried out with the aim to realize a vehicle characterized by ease of transportability and deployment, available payload and performance in terms of speed and endurance.

Three hull types have been modelled in a computer-aided design environment and then optimized through fluid dynamics analysis for a cruise speed of 1.5 kN. The results of these simulations have been used to choose the best hull shape in terms of resistance, in order to comply with the constraints of autonomy and available payload.

Finally, a scaled model of the best hull shape has been then tested in a circulating water channel to validate simulation data.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.

Buying options

Chapter
USD   29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD   169.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD   219.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Learn about institutional subscriptions

References

  1. Manley, J.E.: Unmanned surface vehicles, 15 years of development. In: OCEANS 2008, pp. 1–4. IEEE (2008)

    Google Scholar 

  2. Caccia, M.: Autonomous surface craft: prototypes and basic research issues. In: 2006 14th Mediterranean Conference on Control and Automation, pp. 1–6 (2006)

    Google Scholar 

  3. Bertram, V.: Unmanned surface vehicles-a survey. Skibsteknisk Selskab, Copenhagen, Denmark 1, 1–14 (2008)

    Google Scholar 

  4. Bayat, B., Crasta, N., Crespi, A., Pascoal, A.M., Ijspeert, A.: Environmental monitoring using autonomous vehicles: a survey of recent searching techniques. Curr. Opin. Biotechnol. 45, 76–84 (2017)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Dunbabin, M., Grinham, A., Udy, J.: An autonomous surface vehicle for water quality monitoring. In: Australasian Conference on Robotics and Automation (ACRA), pp. 2–4 (2009)

    Google Scholar 

  6. Jorge, V.A., Granada, R., Maidana, R.G., Jurak, D.A., Heck, G., Negreiros, A.P., Amory, A.M.: A survey on unmanned surface vehicles for disaster robotics: main challenges and directions. Sensors 19(3), 702 (2019)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Muller-Graf, B., Radojcic, D., Simic, A.: Resistance and propulsion characteristics of the VWS hard chine catamaran hull series’ 89. SNAME Trans. 110, 1–29 (2002)

    Google Scholar 

  8. Molland, A.F., Wellicome, J.F., Couser, P.R.: Resistance experiments on a systematic series of high speed displacement catamaran forms: variation of length-displacement ratio and breadth-draught ratio. Ship Science Report, University of Southampton (1994)

    Google Scholar 

  9. Sahoo, P.K., Browne, N.A., Salas, M.: Experimental and CFD study of wave resistance of high-speed round bilge catamaran hull forms. In: Proceedings of 4th International Conference on High Performance Marine Vehicles, Rome, Italy (2004)

    Google Scholar 

  10. Cucinotta, F., Nigrelli, V., Sfravara, F.: A preliminary method for the numerical prediction of the behavior of air bubbles in the design of Air Cavity Ships. In: Advances on Mechanics, Design Engineering and Manufacturing, pp. 509–516. Springer, Cham (2017)

    Google Scholar 

  11. Hirt, C.W., Nichols, B.D.: Volume of fluid (VOF) method for the dynamics of free boundaries. J. Comput. Phys. 39(1), 201–225 (1981)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Lam, C.K.G., Bremhorst, K.: A modified form of the k-ε model for predicting wall turbulence. J. Fluids Eng. 103(3), 456–460 (1981)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  13. Ahmed, Y.M.: Numerical simulation for the free surface flow around a complex ship hull form at different Froude numbers. Alex. Eng. J. 50(3), 229–235 (2011)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  14. Cucinotta, F., Guglielmino, E., Sfravara, F.: An experimental comparison between different artificial air cavity designs for a planing hull. Ocean Eng. 140, 233–243 (2017)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Barbieri, L., Calzone, F., Muzzupappa, M.: Form and function: functional optimization and Additive Manufacturing. In: Advances on Mechanics, Design Engineering and Manufacturing II, pp. 649–658. Springer, Cham (2019)

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Loris Barbieri .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2020 Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this paper

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this paper

Barbieri, L. et al. (2020). Design and Simulation of the Hull of a Small-Sized Autonomous Surface Vehicle for Seabed Mapping. In: Rizzi, C., Andrisano, A.O., Leali, F., Gherardini, F., Pini, F., Vergnano, A. (eds) Design Tools and Methods in Industrial Engineering. ADM 2019. Lecture Notes in Mechanical Engineering. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-31154-4_36

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-31154-4_36

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-31153-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-31154-4

  • eBook Packages: EngineeringEngineering (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics