Testbed for Development of Networked Autonomous Underwater Vehicles

Development of underwater vehicles is a complex and challenging task. Especially the integration of components like sensors and actuators in a control loop is difficult and costly and requires many experiments. One of the difficulties is the lack of debugging facilities underwater. In this paper, we suggest a distributed system architecture and a testbed concept for the development of networked autonomous underwater vehicles. Our approach is based on standard Ethernet and TCP/IP enabling use of industrial hardware like single board computers and switches. Furthermore, we suggest a mesh network with a layer 2 ad-hoc routing for wireless interconnection of underwater vehicles and infrastructure like base stations. The suggested mesh network integrates WiFi for communication on the surface and underwater electrical field communication. To support the integration process of sensors and actuators we suggest external components for our testbed. We implement an external component including a remotely operated underwater vehicle. This remotely operated underwater vehicle serves as a carrier for sensors and allows the implementation of a control loop in underwater environments. We set up a testbed and present an evaluation of the ad-hoc routing and a dedicated control application with the remotely operated vehicle in a water tub.