The project of “Practical Reconstruction of 6000 AUV”, undertaken by the Autonomous Underwater Vehicles Technology Department of Shenyang Institute of Automation (SIA), the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) has finished sea test recently. Experts on the assessment panel came to the agreement that the 6000 AUV (autonomous underwater vehicle) has achieved the goal set up for the sea test, and is capable of performing ocean application survey.

The 6000 AUV project is one of China’s international sea resources investigation and development planning projects under the 12th Five-Year Plan of China. It was set up for the investigation of polymetallic modules in the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, as well as the exploration and development of deep sea resources in other oceans.

During the sea test, the 6000 AUV project team overcame the difficulties of high-temperature, high-humidity and sea-sickness, and conducted several overall performance tests in large depth, including structure strength, deep water pressure tolerance, deep sea trim, deployment and retrieval, autonomous navigation control, integrated navigation, acoustic detection, optical detection, and hydrographic parameters measurement, etc. The deployment and retrieval of the AUV were realized without the workers going down with the vehicle. During the sea test, researchers on the team obtained effective detection data, perfected the operation codes of the system, laying solid foundation for real application of the AUV.

Source: Autonomous Underwater Vehicles Technology Department