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Antarctic Undersea ROV 09

Hello Team, I want my students to design their own ROVs for exploring Antarctica. What are some of the basic specifications that the SCINI was designed for? weight dimensions power supply scientific equipment operating temperatures And any others you can think of.

We are looking forward to following your expedition. Fellow PolarTREC teacher, Betsy Wilkening P.S. I like the pictures of your cats!

Sun, 09/20/2009 - 21:00

Stacy Kim

Hi Betsy,It will be wonderful to have your students design ROVs!
Any engineering project should start with a clear definition of what
problem you are trying to solve. The design, and constraints on it,
will evolve from that. SCINI solves the problem of how to get through
the frozen surface of a polar sea with a minimum of logistic support.
Thus, for example, SCINI's diameter is set by the size of the Jiffy
drill bits that are available. Detailed technical information on the
first iteration of SCINI is available at this link http://scini.mlml.calstate.edu/SCINI_2007/resources.html
I encourage you to work with your students to understand that
engineering is about solving problems, more than building Rube
Goldberg contraptions. The building itself is very fun, but it's way
more fun and satisfying if you are building something that has a
purpose and does it elegantly. You might want to have an ROV that can
be launched by one person - so you need to figure out how much weight
one person can lift easily, and that will set your weight limit. You
might want an ROV that runs off US household power, so 120 VAC at 60
Hz would be your power source. Where will you be working with your
ROV? That will set the operating temperatures. And finally (and for
me, most important :)), what are the science questions you want to
answer? As an ecologist, the first thing I need to do in a new
ecosystem is to describe the communities. For this I need imagery,
and a precise way to measure distances on a small scale (mm) for sizes
of animals, and a larger scale (up to 100s of m) for distributions of
animals on a map. So SCINI has cameras, and lasers for scaling, and
an excellent navigation system. But a chemist, or a geologist, would
want different things. With your background in chemistry, maybe
incorporating a CTD for basic water characteristics would be most
relevant.
You might want to keep an eye on this site http://www.hydrobot.org/
where we are building a computer based simulation of piloting an ROV
under the ice in Antarctica. This educational product is nearly ready
for release, and could be a great addition to your classwork.
Im not sure what grade your classes are, so if this is too complex, I
hope we can communicate more to dial in the right level. And Michele
will have very valuable input to help with the translation!
Best, Stacy
On Sep 20, 2009, at 4:37 PM, webmaster@polartrec.com wrote:

Mon, 09/21/2009 - 03:52

Michele Cross

Hi Betsy, As you can imagine, my learning curve has been space shuttle lift off like! When I first laid eyes on SCINI , I was quite taken with her simplicity--sleek and simple. I was shocked to find that she is 35 lbs. and able to be lifted by one person; although, we're supposed to use two people. Her length is slightly under 4 feet. When I did the metric conversion it was 3.9 ft. Her diameter is 6 in. which allows us to hand drill an 8 inch hole for her. (I apologize for the not using metrics...my students can better understand English measurements and comparisons with everyday objects.) I did a number of presentations last week and marveled in watching the expressions of students AND adults change as I went through all the things that makes SCINI unique. The PS2 game controller got the biggest response by far. You could literally see their eyes twinkle and dance and then the wheels started turning.
I always stress that this started with a question--"What's under the ice in Antarctica?" Then the problem--"How do we get there?" A solution was posed, and a challenge ensued. And, in the end, we have SCINI!! Challenge successfuly met! A rather nice process!
Looking forward to hearing about the status of your student's progress on their ROV!
Michele
PS Thanks in regards to the felines. They are both rescues--from different places--and will have been with me three years this fall!!

Mon, 09/21/2009 - 09:00

Stacy Kim

Hi Besty,You might want to contact PolarTREC teachers Jillian Worssam and Robin
Ellwood who are also interested in ROVs!
Best, Stacy
On Sep 21, 2009, at 4:52 AM, webmaster@polartrec.com wrote:

Wed, 09/23/2009 - 18:56

Betsy Wilkening

Thanks for all the info.  I will work on creating a "design" project for my 7th graders.  We will probably just be doing scale models at this point but I'll see what we can come up with.We'll be following you closely.  After working in Barrow, AK last spring I know how many logisitical problems the cold can cause and I hope yours are minimum.
Betsy

Thu, 09/24/2009 - 12:00

Stacy Kim

Hi Betsy,It would be neat to have them work individually or in small groups to
design several ROVs to deal with different conditions/questions. I
know that is more work in terms of grading and all, and I do not know
if your class size makes that infeasible, but it would be a good way
to start discussions about all the many different ways to solve a
problem, and then ultimately why one solution is chosen over
another...for example, there are infinite ways that you can position
thrusters, but only one way that is best for the way you need your
vehicle to move. It's a fun paper problem even if they are not
building the vehicles!
Best, Stacy
On Sep 23, 2009, at 7:56 PM, webmaster@polartrec.com wrote: