Document Type

Restricted Campus Only

Publication Date

4-23-2024

Abstract

This report covers everything the team has accomplished over the Fall and Spring semesters, including math models, prototypes, tests, and test results. This report also includes an overview of the design’s subsystems, a section highlighting issues the team faced, an evaluation of the final design against the constraints, and a listing of recommendations for future work.

RoboNation, one of the project sponsors, provided the team with a SeaGlide model as an initial prototype. The SeaGlide is a water-bottle-sized buoyancy glider that the team used for basic testing and to develop ideas about creating a larger-scale buoyancy glider. The team completed tests measuring the distance the SeaGlide could travel and the weight it could carry. Although the SeaGlide was not designed to carry a cargo load, the team's testing determined that it can carry 350 grams of dead weight, which is approximately 30% of its total weight. When testing the travel distance and speed, the team’s best test resulted in 6.57 meters of horizontal distance traveled over 4.27 meters of depth, equating to a slope of 33 degrees and a horizontal velocity of 0.2 meters per second. While the SeaGlide was a helpful base design, the final prototype was significantly different.

While the final prototype still operated on the same physical principles as the SeaGlide, the larger scale pushed the team to change much of the design. The engine underwent the largest design change and now uses a bladder instead of a syringe to take in and purge water from the hull. As the final prototype design was changed to adapt to available resources and the issues of scaling up, some of the tests the team had planned for the final prototype needed to be altered. Using independent subsystems of the final prototype, the team performed multiple tests: the buoyancy engine water manipulation test, the hull integrity test, and the buoyancy test. The full prototype test and the weight fluctuation tests were never performed because they were deemed too risky given the final state of the prototype. The buoyancy engine water manipulation test was intended to determine if the buoyancy engine is capable of producing enough force to purge the water inside the bladder. Testing determined that the engine produces a force of 10 pounds, which according to the team's math model is capable of purging water at a maximum depth of 0.36 feet. `The hull integrity test evaluates how robust the hull is and how well it prevents internal leakage. After many iterations of redesign and testing the final hull design contains a sealed bladder and can be fully submerged without taking on significant water. However, the hull still struggles to maintain this sealing ability once it is loaded to be neutrally buoyant.

The buoyancy test evaluates whether the water taken into the bladder is enough to alter the buoyancy. This was done without the engine to prevent any potential water damage. The test proved that if the glider is loaded with around 84 pounds, the addition of a full bladder of water is enough to shift the glider from positive to negative buoyancy.

Overall, the team developed a robust hull, a functioning buoyancy engine mechanism, and a useful model for the necessary loading of the glider. The remainder of this report discusses these designs and their testing in more detail.

Comments

Dr. Michael Enright, Team Adviser

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