Our 3 AUV's are used for geophysical surveys mostly for Oil and Gas companies but sometimes for the scientific community, finding shipwrecks and government agencies such as NOAA. Currently I am surveying off the coast of Brasil with our original AUV. Our second is working for a major university in the Gulf of Mexico and our third is getting ready for a trip to Baku.
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The C-Surveyor I is rated for 3000 meters (10,000ft). It's survey sensors include the following: 200 kHz multibeam bathymetry & imagery, Dual frequency sidescan (120 & 410 kHz), Subbottom profiler (2-10 kHz), CTD.
Other ancillary sensors include: HiPAP USBL, Inertial Navigation system, Doppler velocity log, Fiber optic gyro, High & Low Speed Acoustic links, DGPS & UHF radio (Surface).
C & C's Survey AUV
The AUV is powered by an aluminum oxygen fuel cell with ni-cad back up batteries. With the fuel cell power source, the AUV can travel at 4 knots for at least 50 hours with all sensors running. The overall size of the AUV is 5.3m long (17ft) and is1.0m in diameter (3.3ft).
The AUV has numerous safety devices to allow it to surface when a significant problem arises. Various triggers are linked to two drop weights and an air bladder.
Survey lines and sensor settings can be pre-programmed into the AUV. Lines can be aborted and the survey program can be altered via the acoustic telemetry link while the survey is underway. Most of the settings for the survey sensors can also be remotely controlled via the link. Multibeam, sidescan, subbottom, and positioning data are recorded in the AUV. Decimated data from these sensors is transmitted from the AUV to the ship. This allows real time quality assurance of the data, and real time feedback on the bottom conditions. Positioning of the data is done using HiPAP USBL, the inertial navigation system, and the Doppler velocity log integrated in a Kalman filter.