• The Journal of Korea Robotics Society
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.226-234
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• 2016

In this study, a model-referenced underwater navigation algorithm is proposed for high-precise underwater navigation using monocular vision near underwater structures. The main idea of this navigation algorithm is that a 3D model-based pose estimation is combined with the inertial navigation using an extended Kalman filter (EKF). The spatial information obtained from the navigation algorithm is utilized for enabling the underwater robot to navigate near underwater structures whose geometric models are known a priori. For investigating the performance of the proposed approach the model-referenced navigation algorithm was applied to an underwater robot and a set of experiments was carried out in a water tank.

• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
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• v.19 no.8
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• pp.702-708
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• 2013

Underwater TRN (Underwater Terrain Referenced Navigation) estimates an underwater vehicle state by measuring a distance between the vehicle and undersea terrain, and comparing it with the known terrain database. TRN belongs to absolute navigation methods, which are used to compensate a drift error of dead reckoning measurements such as IMU (Inertial Measurement Unit) or DVL (Doppler Velocity Log). However, underwater TRN is different to other absolute methods such as USBL (Ultra-Short Baseline) and LBL (Long Baseline), because TRN is independent of the external environment. As a magnetic-field-based navigation, TRN is a kind of geophysical navigation. This paper develops an EKF (Extended Kalman Filter) formulation for underwater TRN. A filter propagation part is composed by an inertial navigation system, and a filter update is executed with echo-sounder measurement. For large-initial-error cases, an adaptive EKF approach is also presented, to keep the filter be stable. At the end, simulation studies are given to verify the performance of the proposed TRN filter. With simplified sensor and terrain database models, the simulation results show that the underwater TRN could support conventional underwater navigation methods.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Navigation and Port Research Conference
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• v.1
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• pp.333-335
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• 2006

Position of surface objects can be fixed in many ways. The most popular radionavigational systems, including satellite systems, make possible obtaining nearly continuous and very precise ship's position. However, under the water application of radionavigational systems is impossible. Underwater navigation requires other tools and solutions then these encountered in surface and air navigation. In underwater environment vehicles and submarines, operate that have to possess alternative navigational systems. Underwater vehicles, in order to perform their tasks require accurate information about their own, current position. At present, they are equipped with inertial navigational systems (INS). Accuracy of INS is very high but in relatively short periods. Position error is directly proportional to time of working of the system. The basic feature of INS is its autonomy and passivity. This characteristic mainly decides that INS is broadly used on submarines and other underwater vehicles. However, due to previously mentioned shortcoming i.e. gradually increasing position error, periodical calibration of the system is necessary. The simplest calibration method is surface or nearly surface application of GPS system. Another solution, which does not require interruption of performed task and emergence on the surface, is application of comparative navigation technique. Information about surrounding environment of the ship, obtained e.g. by means sonic depth finder or board sonar, and comparing it with accessible pattern can be used in order to fix ship's position. The article presents a structure and a description of working of underwater vehicle navigation system simulator. The simulator works on the basis of comparative navigation methods which exploit in turn digital images of echograms and sonograms. The additional option of the simulator is ability to robust estimation of measurements. One can do it in order to increase accuracy of position fixed with comparative navigation methods application. The simulator can be a basis to build future underwater navigation system.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Navigation and Port Research Conference
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• v.1
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• pp.513-517
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• 2006

Autonomous Underwater Vehicles plays specific role in underwater investigation. Generally, this kind of vehicles will move along a planned path for sea bottom or underwater installations inspections, search for mineral deposits along shelves, seeking lost items including bottom mines or for hydrographic measurements. A crucial barrier for it remains the possibility of precise determination of their underwater position. Commonly used radionavigation systems do not work in such circumstances or do not guarantee the required accuracies. In the paper some new solution is proposed on the assumption that it is possible to increase the precision by certain processing of a combination of measurements conducted by means of different techniques. Objective of the paper is the idea of navigation of AUV which consists of two phases: firstly a trip of AUV along pre-planned route and after that postprocessed transformation of collected data in post-processing mode. During the processing of collected data the modern adjustment methods have been applied, mainly estimation by means of least squares and M-estimation. Application of these methods should be associated with the measuring and geometric conditions of navigational tasks and thus suited for specific scientific and technical problems of underwater navigation. The first results of computer aided investigation will be presented and the basic scope of these application and possible development directions will be indicated also. The paper is prepared as an partial results of the works carried out within a framework of the research Project: 'Improvement of the Precise Underwater Vehicle Navigation Methods' financed by the Polish Ministry of Education and Science (No 0 T00A 012 25).

• Journal of Ocean Engineering and Technology
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.106-113
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• 2008

This paper presents an underwater navigation system based on range measurements from a known reference station fixed on the sea bottom or floated at surface with a buoy, for which the system is extended to 3-dimensional coordinates. We formulated a state equation in polar coordinates and constituted an extended Kalman filter for discrete-time implementation of the navigation algorithm. The autonomous underwater vehicle, lSiMl, cruising with a constant speed can estimate its trajectory using just range measurements and additional depth, heading and pitch sensors. Simulation studies were performed to evaluate the underwater navigation of the maneuvering AUV with range measurements. We modulated the sample rate of range measurements to evaluate the effect of the update rate, and changed the initial position error of the AUV to check the robustness to estimation errors. Simulation results illustrates that the extended navigation system provides convergence of the state estimates. The navigation system was conditionally stable when it had initial position errors.

• Journal of Positioning, Navigation, and Timing
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• v.12 no.1
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• pp.67-73
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• 2023

As interest in underwater structures and ocean exploration increases, many researchers are proposing methods for modeling and controlling various remotely operated vehicles (ROVs). Recently, hybrid systems composed of an autonomous underwater vehicle and an ROV capable of remote control and autonomous navigation are being developed. In this study we introduce a method that models Ariari-aROV, an ROV consisting of five thrusters, and performs navigation. The proposed ROV can be controlled manually and by autonomous navigation when given a target point. An extended Kalman filter is utilized for sensor measurement correction for more precise navigation. The proposed method is verified through a simulation.

• Journal of Positioning, Navigation, and Timing
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.165-173
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• 2018

Underwater vehicles use Inertial Navigation System (INS) with high-performance Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) for high precision navigation. However, when underwater navigation is performed for a long time, the INS error gradually diverges, therefore, an integrated navigation method using auxiliary sensors is used to solve this problem. In terms of underwater vehicles, the vertical axis error is primarily compensated through Vertical Channel Damping (VCD) using a depth gauge, and an integrated navigation filter can be designed to perform horizontal axis error and sensor error correction using a speedometer such as Electromagnetic-Log (EM-Log). However, since EM-Log outputs the forward direction relative speed of the vehicle with respect to the sea and sea current, INS correction filter using this may cause a rather large error. Although it is possible to design proper filters if the exact model of the sea current is known, it is impossible to know the accurate model in reality. Therefore, this study proposes an INS/EM-Log integrated navigation filter with the function to estimate sea current using an Interacting Multiple Model (IMM) filters, and the performance of this filter is analyzed through a simulation performed in various environments.

• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
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• v.19 no.8
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• pp.682-687
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• 2013

Navigation is a crucial capability for all types of manned or unmanned vehicles. However, vehicle navigation in underwater environments still remains a challenging problem since GPS signals for position fixes are not available in the water. Terrain-referenced underwater navigation is an alternative navigation technique that utilizes geometric information of the subsea terrain to correct drift errors due to dead-reckoning or inertial navigation. Terrain-referenced navigation requires the description of an undulating terrain surface as a mathematical function or table, which often leads to a highly nonlinear estimation problem. Recently, PFs (Particle Filters), which do not require any restrictive assumptions about the system dynamics and uncertainty distributions, have been widely used for nonlinear filtering applications. However, PF has considerable computational requirements which used to limit its applicability to problems of relatively low state dimensions. This study proposes the use of a Rao-Blackwellized particle filter that is computationally more efficient than the standard PF for terrain-referenced underwater navigation involving a moderate number of states, and its performance is compared with that of the extended Kalman filter algorithm. The validity and feasibility of the proposed algorithm is demonstrated through numerical simulations.

• Journal of Ocean Engineering and Technology
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.73-80
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• 2003

This paper presents considerations on the results of the rotating arm test, which was carried out for assessment of an hybrid navigation system for a semi-autonomous underwater vehicle. The navigation system consists of an inertial measurement unit(IMU), an ultra-short baseline(USBL) acoustic navigation sensor and a doppler velocity log(DVL) accompanying a magnetic compass. A navigational systemmodel is derived to include the scale effect and bias errors of the DVL, of which the state equation composed of the navigation states and sensor parameters are 25 in the order. The extended Kalman filter was used to propagate the error covariance, The rotating arm tests were carried out in the Ocean Engineering Basin of KRISO, to generate circular motion. The hybrid underwater navigation system shows good tracking performance against the circular planar motion. Additionally this paper checked the effects of the sampling ratio of the navigation system and the possibility of the dead reckoning with the DVL and the magnetic compass to estimate the position of the vehicle.

• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
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• v.19 no.9
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• pp.774-781
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• 2013

The purpose of this paper is to design a DVL-RPM based VKF (Velocity Kalman Filter) design for a performance improvement underwater integrated navigation system. The proposed approach relies on a VKF, augmented by a altitude from Echo-sounder based switching architecture to yield robust performance, even when DVL (Doppler Velocity Log) exceeds the measurement range and the measured value is unable to be valid. The proposed approach relies on two parts: 1) Indirect feedback navigation Kalman filter design, 2) VKF design. To evaluate proposed method, we compare the results of the VKF aided navigation system with simulation result from a PINS (Pure Inertial Navigation System) and conventional INS-DVL method. Simulations illustrate the effectiveness of the underwater navigation system assisted by the additional DVL-RPM based VKF in underwater environment.