Remote Ocean Systems Super-8 film camera is used for gathering both still and 

 motion picture photographs on keyboard or preprogrammed command. The future 

 importance of the data acquisition subsystem is not what or how many sensors 

 are incorporated, but whether these can be used to provide better autonomous 

 control of the submersible and whether information concerning structural 

 faults or leaks can be automatically derived to alert an operator as to their 

 location. Such technologies will be investigated in the future as a part of 

 this program. 



Physical Tasks Subsystem 



With the intent of using EAVE WEST as a testbed and with financial sup- 

 port from both the Office of Naval Research and NOSC's Independent Exploratory 

 Development funding, a manipulator is being developed. The electrically driv- 

 en manipulator (figure 16) has 5 deg of freedom in addition to jaw closure. 

 Degrees of freedom from top to bottom include shoulder pivot and rotate, elbow 

 joint, wrist rotate, and wrist pivot. Its six pressure-compensated, oil- 

 filled motors incorporate position feedback potentiometers and harmonic drive 

 gearing. Total lift capability is 25 lb vertically and approximately 8 lb at 

 full extension. The total weight of the manipulator is 34 lb in air. Motor 

 housings are fabricated of hard black-anodized aluminum, whereas the other 

 support components are composed of fiberglass with the arm itself filled with 

 syntactic foam to conserve weight in water, which is about 30 lb. The arm it- 

 self has already been fabricated and tested. 



Plans are to drive the arm in a supervisory-controlled fashion using LSI 

 11/23, 16-bit minicomputers packaged both in a vehicle housing and at the 

 surface console area. This will reduce the vast amount of bandwidth and 

 operator training otherwise required when using a manipulator on a remotely 

 controlled vehicle. Computer software is being supplied by MIT as an adapta- 

 tion of MIT's effort in supervisory-controlled manipulators and man/machine 

 interface for ONR (reference 12). A diagram showing the supervisory- 

 controlled manipulator as designed for integration with the LSI 11/23 printed 

 circuit cards and control components is in figure 17. The device will be 

 installed on the vehicle, as indicated in figure 3C. Although the manipulator 

 is shown mounted at the front of the vehicle to allow reaching into crowded 

 areas, system modularity will also allow it to be mounted at the center of the 

 vehicle. This would especially be useful for picking up instrument packages 

 or seafloor samples when operating along a pipeline or in an open area. 



Technological problems to be solved include the following: 



1. The use of a measurement arm to facilitate operation when relative 

 motion is present between the vehicle and the work site. 



2. The use of electrically induced compliance to facilitate final ap- 

 proach and grasp operations. 



3. The use of low bandwidth measurements of the position of the manipu- 

 lator's endpoint to update slow scan television pictures as to the 

 continual status of the manipulator position. 



37 



