Modeled on a black tip reef shark – the “Blacktip” drone was our first drone, and our primary research platform for exploring different hull construction techniques.
The bio-inspired design enabled us to explore bio-mimicry for solving underwater hydrodynamics and control problems for autonomous craft.
Hull construction was the culmination of our research into different techniques combining 3D printing and polymer casting, to create custom, low cost, pressure hulls for underwater robotics.
The shark is now a research platform for testing new sensors. “BlackTip” has extensible mount points on along the keel, tail, and the pectoral and dorsal fins for mounting future hardware. The platform also has a flooded hatch with access to power, data, and compressed air for use by future external payloads.
The design is left right symmetric – so in order to easily see the current layout of the internals of the design, it is pictured above with the left half (the drones right half) transparent. The wiring and the tubing for the ballast control system have also been left out of the pictures to aid in visibility.
Components
More information about the various components of Blacktip are available at the links below:
