DIY sub remote vehicle

Build/Make DIY ROVs
1

DIY sub uses Blue Robotic software

hardware is standard Pi4 and Pixhawk controller

30 meter and 100 meter neutrally buoyant tether

running cockpit extension on laptop running Windows 11

records video using cockpit extension

2

Hi @harland, cool project - thanks for sharing! :smiley:

Glad you managed to claw it back from the weeds - they don’t always play kindly so it’s a wrestle sometimes…

Visuals in muddy water are always tricky - it looks like you’re getting a fair amount of internal reflections, so it may help if you can black out the internal area around the camera, just so it has more signal to work with from in the water. If you’ve got a flat port then you can also move the camera closer to it (hardware and other tradeoffs permitting), since you’re not trying to get the lens right in the focal point of a dome :slight_smile:

3

Thanks for the advice
By flat port do you mean a flat face that the camera looks through? (which is what I have on the 4 inch tube)
I am moving to cleaner water next.
I live in upper NYS and Seneca Lake and Cayuga Lake are close by.
I wanted to test the ROV before driving somewhere.
I appreciate Blue Robotics software!
John

4

Yep - that’s what I was referring to :slight_smile:

5

Hi @harland,

BTW, we’ve got a blog post over here on the ardupilot site of HenryW’s DIY sub Simple, Low Cost, DIY ArduSub - Blog - ArduPilot Discourse

6

thanks for letting me know
john

7

took the rov to Cayuga Lake in upstate NY, USA

did not have any problems with weeds, but didn’t see much, unless on the bottom

had the rov in the water for around 40 min., no leaks or problems

have videos from Cockpit camera and GoPro camera

it would be nice to capture the whole laptop screen with data like temperature and depth instead of just the camera video stream

I am adding (3D printing now) a sail for the top to help me steer it straighter, I hope…

8

Hi @harland -

Cockpit let’s you specify what telemetry you want on screen, and where, saving a subtitle telemetry file so when played back in VLC media player, you can also use handbrake to"burn" then into the video file so they always appear.

9

thanks, I will give it a try
john