Subsea UUV Garage with Retractable Posts and Protective Lid
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Existing subsea AUV garages face challenges in providing protection against trawling and dropped objects, especially for top-entry designs, while maintaining flexibility and accessibility, as they are vulnerable to snagging and damage.
Innovation Solution
A subsea garage with movable posts and a telescopic lid system that deploys and retracts to guide AUVs, providing protection and facilitating lifting, while minimizing snagging hazards and ensuring accessibility, by using a conical skirt and extensible post structure.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If a top-entry basket design is used for subsea AUV garage, then flexibility and accessibility are improved, but protection against trawling and dropped objects deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The garage employs a movable lid that can transition between open and closed positions, and extensible posts that can extend upward when needed. This dynamic configuration allows the structure to adapt between providing protection (closed lid) and allowing access (open lid), resolving the contradiction between flexibility and protection.
2Extent of automation
If rigid upstanding posts are used as identifying features for AUV docking, then automation of recognition and docking is improved, but snagging risk from trawl fishing nets increases
Solution Approach 1:
The posts are designed to be extensible rather than permanently rigid. They can extend upward to provide visual identification features for AUV docking automation, then retract or be covered by the closed lid to minimize snagging risk from fishing nets. This dynamic behavior resolves the contradiction between automation needs and fishing safety.
Solution Approach 2:
The lid is positioned to cover the posts when not in use, proactively preventing potential snagging before fishing activity occurs. This preliminary protective action allows the posts to be deployed for docking automation without creating persistent hazards.
3Ease of operation
If an open-topped basket structure is used, then accessibility for AUV entry is improved, but vulnerability to dropped objects increases
Solution Approach 1:
The movable lid provides a dynamic solution that allows the garage to be open for accessibility during AUV entry/exit operations, then close to provide protection against dropped objects when the AUV is docked inside. This temporal separation of functions resolves the contradiction between accessibility and protection.
Data Source
Figure 1a~1b
Figure 2a~2d
Figure 3a~3b
AI summary
A subsea garage (36) for a UUV comprises a body (12) having a receptacle for the UUV, an open top providing a transit path for the UUV into and out of the receptacle and a base opposed to the open top, the base being arranged to lie on the seabed. At least one post (22) is movable, subsea, relative to the body into a deployed position extending upwardly from the body above the open top. A lid (16) may also be movable relative to the body between a closed position that closes the open top and an open position that allows the UUV to move along the transit path through the open top. A fixed post may extend upwardly from the body above the open top, in which case the lid may enclose the post when in the closed position and expose the post when in the open position.