Mechatronic Design of an Underwater Multisensor System for Optical Data Acquisition

The paper presents the electromechanical design of a vision system, developed by the ISME nodes of the University of Florence (UNIFI) and the University of Pisa (UNIPI), Italy. The main objective is to design a platform to test Visual Odometry algorithms that can be employed both as a standalone device or in conjunction with an Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV); in this regard, the module presents a wide variety of sensors and is designed to have its own power supply. The project constraints are described and the main features of the final design are reported. The mechanical and electrical assemblies are presented together with the main static and fluid dynamics analyses. The module will be assembled and tested during Spring 2022.