As I always mention, making aquatic Robots is one of my most favorite things! It might be because of the fact that I’m a huge fan of Marine Biology since I was in high school. Today, in addition to being an entrepreneur and Roboticist, I am an amateur Marine Biologist, Herpetologist and a Wildlifer too.
So let’s come to the point, I started building my first ROV back in 2009, to participate in a Robotics competition in Indian Institute of Technology Bombay’s Techfest event. It is one the largest academic technology events in Asia. However I could not complete building the robot before competition because I had a lot of studies in high school, because I had opted for the Computer Science specialization. Still I slowly completed the Robot later. I am still building and improving the original model and have designed a number of other ROVs.
The first ROV had a very simple design. A rectangular frame was made using UPVC pipes and joints. Two DC brushed motors were mounted on each side of the frame. These were navigation motors. The ROV would turn using differential turning. A third motors was attached in the middle of the rectangular frame, used to control the depth. A control unit that consisted of Arduino Microcontroller and L293 motor drivers was kept inside an air-tight plastic container and fixed in the middle of the frame. The power and controls were provided using a wired controller. Sand was added to the bottom of the container for buoyance. Overall it was a simple yet workable ROV.
This was my first ROV that I built. In later years, I have designed several ROVs and Swarm systems for specific tasks, however I’ve not yet found an opportunity to test their applications. A reputed Marine Biologist has shown his willingness to test my ROVs for environmental research whenever I’d build one. I am looking forward to create my professional ROV designs after having enough time, finances and technical capabilities.