Design of A Self-Correctable Docking Mechanism in Disturbed Water Surface Environment

• Published in: IEEE robotics and automation letters Vol. 9; no. 11; pp. 9773 - 9780
• Main Authors: Cao, Zhongzhong, Zhang, Lianxin, Xu, Ruoyu, Liu, Chongfeng, Lin, Bairun, Ji, Xiaoqiang, Qian, Huihuan
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Piscataway IEEE 01.11.2024; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Aquatic environment; Autonomous vehicles; Data acquisition; Data communication; Data transmission; Docking; Docking mechanism; fixed angle; Latches; passive latch; Pontoons; Projectiles; self-correction; Shock absorbers; Springs; Surface treatment; surface unmanned vehicle; Surface vehicles; Underactuated surface vessels; Unmanned vehicles
• ISSN: 2377-3766; 2377-3766
• DOI: 10.1109/LRA.2023.3244121

The docking mechanism is critical for unmanned surface vehicle (USV) applications, such as traction, dragging, charging, data transmission, building pontoons, etc. These applications are significant for observation, exploration, data acquisition, patrol, rescuing, etc., in aquatic environments. In this letter, a novel autonomous docking mechanism for USVs is proposed. It is capable of (1) docking the USV subject to disturbance efficiently, (2) latching without power consumption after the docking is completed, and (3) guiding the docking head to three specific angles at the end of the docking process. This letter proved the feasibility and rationality of the docking mechanism through theoretical force analysis. Experiments with three different scenarios are implemented to test the mechanism's performance. The experimental results show that the docking success rate is greater than or equal to 90<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">\%</tex-math></inline-formula> on the disturbed water surface.