AUV Docking Method in a Confined Reservoir with Good Visibility
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AUV Docking Method in a Confined Reservoir with Good Visibility Mingwei Lin 1 & Canjun Yang 1,2,3 Received: 14 November 2019 / Accepted: 11 February 2020 # Springer Nature B.V. 2020
Abstract Underwater docking technology enables autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) to execute long-term observation missions by periodically recovering and recharging AUVs. The conventional AUV homing and docking operations utilize acoustic and optical sensors at different ranges relative to the docking station. However, this method cannot perform perfectly in confined water regions because of the acoustic reflection and multipath effect. Thus, this paper proposes a novel navigation system, which fuses downward-looking visual odometry and model-based velocity for homing, and recognizes and tracks the light marker for terminal docking, in order to overcome the defects of the conventional navigation method. The reservoir experiment result verifies the effectiveness of the proposed method and shows good potential to extended applications in underwater routine cruise. Keywords Autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) . Docking technology . Data fusion . Visual guidance
1 Introduction Autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) are playing an increasingly important role in ocean exploration and observation. With the technological advances, the application scenarios of AUVs are not limited to the open oceans and can also be extended to some confined water regions, such as the pool, reservoir and the aquarium. The power-intensive instrumentation consumes much energy of AUVs and limits their working periods. This means that for nearly all the missions, the AUV should be attended by a surface vessel or shoreside staff, increasing much cost and inconvenience for missions. Underwater docking technology enables AUVs to be autonomously guided to the docking station, to recharge the batteries, download data, upload a new mission plan, and safely park until the next mission [1, 2]. The navigation process of AUV docking can be divided into homing and docking stages [3]. The former stage refers to the case where AUV is over 10–25 m away from the docking station (DS) and the later stage refers to the case where the distance between the * Canjun Yang [email protected] 1
State Key Laboratory of Fluid Power and Mechatronic Systems, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310027, China
2
Pilot National Laboratory for Marine Science and Technology (Qingdao), Qingdao 266000, China
3
Ningbo Research Institute, Zhejiang University, Ningbo 315100, China
AUV and the DS is less than 10 m. The ultra-short base line (USBL) positioning system is commonly used for the homing stage because of its error-bounded performance for long-range localization. During the docking stage, the optical guidance [4], camera- based visual guidance [5], and electromagnetic guidance [6] are preferable choices due to their higher localization accuracy. However, in the confined water regions, the performance of the USBL positioning system is remarkably degraded caused by the acoustic reflection and multi
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