Underwater NERDS

We made the boat known as the USS Awesome out of the fish tank and PVC. Currently we’re working on the ROV, Starman. The USS Awesome is working substantially and we are currently attaching the cameras on Starman. We are also testing both robots to work out any bugs that may still be present. We recently submitted our tech report which may be viewed here.

Over the last few days we’ve begun work on our new collection of robots. This year, for the 2009 National Underwater Robotics Competition ‘Fire Under the Ice’, we decided to construct a simple but robust ROV capable of completing every task with the help of an overhead ‘boat’, which will provide assistant lights and another camera angle. Hopefully, since our brush with low lighting and it’s drastic consequences, the bank of halogen lights and multiple viewpoints will allow us to see our environment without a problem.

Our first meeting consisted of setting up a rubric with mission criteria and prioritizing the mission order for the competition. We then knew which tasks were more important and which ones could be put on lower priority.

The last two meetings were spent developing and refining our designs and creating parts lists. We received $1000 funding from the Cochise Robotics Association, which will encompass our entire budget for the build. With restricted access to funds, our plan is to create a low-cost ROV with cheap construction materials and pieces of previous robots.

Images are being put up at our team gallery, feel free to see how progress there as well! We’ll keep updating as the tech report is started and the build continues.

This is the home of 2009 NERDS underwater robot team. We’ll be providing updates of our build as the season progresses, including videos and pictures from our meetings. Have fun perusing the website until then!