On March 16th, our team hosted a game day fundraiser. We had pizza, salad, and turkey for our friends to munch on, while others played gaga ball, volleyball, and card games. Everyone had a blast, and we hope to host another one in the fall! We raised more than our team had expected that to raise, which was an awesome surprise after we worked very hard to get everything planned and set up. Our team recruited 2 new members that day who have jumped in and we now have an amazing photographer as well as a great social media helper. Also, we are counting down the days until the competition: 4 weeks or exactly 28 days or 672 hours. The team is scrambling to get the last minute details and programming done on the carbonAurelia. We are busy working on getting our camera's to identify shapes underwater and overlay the writing over the picture of the shapes. After a little trouble our programmer got to the root of the issue and now the program can recognize the shapes easily! In addition, we have been working on water proofing our motors for our micro ROV and claw. We recently just built a enclosure for our IP cameras so that we can save money instead of buy expensive waterproof cameras. We have also been working on the tools that we need to complete the underwater course. Each year the competition and its goals are different. This year, there are some challenging tasks which we have been able to brainstorm on, and some we have conquered. For example, in the competition we have to transport and release Trout Fry ( simulated by fishing lures) and we had to figure out a easy way to transport them and release them into a designated area on the bottom of the pool. It took us a couple of meeting of tossing around ideas until we finally drew up an idea and in less than the 30 minutes we had a working prototype that only needs a couple tweaks to make it final. Also, we have to determine the lift capability of our ROV before the competition as well as measuring the length of a Civil War Era cannon both of which we are still brainstorming for. Lastly, the team made a last minute decision to change our tether to fiber optic cabling that will help us send data to the places to our ROV and help move ability due to its small size. Fiber optic cable is made up of tiny glass threads which reflect back rapid pulses of light to conduct data. We have been extending our meeting a little longer so we can make sure we get everything accomplished that needs to be accomplished. Everyone on our team is always doing something whether it be a small project or a big project. I know that we can always count on each other to get something completed. We aren't always perfect and sometimes our meeting have little bunny trails to other things that we talk about but everyone is always ready to jump in and work or teach others that don’t know. -SubSea Rovers

December Update: The first semester is almost over, and here’s what we’ve accomplished so far: With the mission specs released, we have been discussing the new and potentially very challenging task for this years competition: building a Micro-ROV. There are many restrictions and specific rules concerning this ROV, which you can read about here. We gain an extra 10 points for using fiber optics to communicate between the two ROVs. To do this, we need to place fiber-optic to ethernet converters on the ROV. To be able to fit these new parts, we designed and 3-D printed an electronics board to help organize the wires for a tighter fit, giving us more space to work with. The Micro-ROV has to undock from the main ROV, enter a 6-inch tube, travel through the tube to take pictures of muddy water flow, and exit the tube and re-dock with the main ROV. To achieve this, we planning on using wheels, powered by a brushless motor, to move inside the tube. A camera mounted in the Micro-ROV will send a video feed through the main ROV and to the surface. Once we have identified the muddy water flow, we will back the micro-rov out of the tube, and reel it in to the main ROV. In addition to the Micro ROV, we are also working on an automatic stabilization for the main ROV. The plan is for the microcontroller to combine input from a gyroscope with the pilot’s control. This would allow the rov to stay upright, even when lifting a heavy object.

Subsea Rovers is back again, competing in the regional 2019 MATE underwater robotics competition and aiming to land a place in the Internationals! This past month has been active, as we planned out the new year and modified our ROV. Here is what we’ve done so far:
Modified ROV Frame
We modified the layout of our ROV to eliminate certain flaws from our previous layout, including buoyancy issues and overall size (see photos below). The new design is much smaller, giving us easier maneuverability in the water, and fewer issues with transportation.
Recruitment
It is the beginning of the school year, and Subsea Rovers is looking for new recruits! We have updated our recruitment page, and we are looking for ways to reach out to people who may wish to join our team. If you are interested in joining, contact us or learn more on our recruitment page.
Rocklin Mini Maker Faire
On October 6th, our team made an appearance at the Rocklin Mini Maker Faire at Sierra College. We were even interviewed by Good Day Sacramento! We explained and demonstrated our ROV to attendees of the Faire, and may have found some new team members. We have many other ideas concerning possible manipulators, fundraising, recruitment, improving the website, team productivity, and more. Follow along with us this year as we build our newest ROV!

Last week we had our first work day of 2018. We finalized our frame design and began to make a 3D model of the ROV. Our frame will be made with carbon fiber poles and 3D printed joints. This weekend we intend to begin assembling our chassis and have already began printing the parts required.

Subsea Rovers is having a fundraiser event at Togos (8053 Greenback Ln, Citrus Heights, CA 95610) for more details and to sign up visit www.evite.com. If can't make it but would still like to support our team you can donate on GoFundMe.

Three years ago we named our team "H&M Robotics", a few months later we changed it to a variation of "Subsea Research" which stuck until now. "Subsea Rovers" conforms better with our website name and will discourage confusion caused by discrepancies between our site and our previous name.

Do you want to be on a team? Do you want to improve your college resume? Join Subsea Rovers! We are looking for: -Creative Writers -Technical Writers -Programmers -Fabricators -Salespeople -Graphic Designers -Artists -Circuit Designers -Machinists Apply here Or contact us at: info@subsearovers.com

At our most recent meeting we went around our neighborhood fundraising door to door. In the brief time we had, we made around $140 of our entire fundraising goal of $3000. At this rate, it would take 30 hours of door to door fundraising to meet our goal. Instead, we are considering several other less time consuming options. First, as we have done in past years, we could make a crowd funding account or some other online donation method and post the link here. Another fundraising method we have done before is to create a sponsor packet and ask businesses for funding, unfortunately we have not had much luck doing this. We are optimistic that we will meet our goal.

Last weekend Subsea Rovers made an appearance at the Rocklin Maker Faire. We spent the day explaining the mechanics and future plans of Subsea Rovers to bypassers. Not only did we tell people about our ROV but we were given advice and encouragement from several professionals in the field of underwater robotics.

In September Subsea Rovers started up once again to compete in the 2018 MATE competition in April (For more information go to MATE). Unfortunately, a few of last years team members could no longer find the time to participate in our meetings and are no longer part of the team (If you are interested in joining Subsea Roversfill out this application or email us at info@subsearovers.com) As we did last year we are using an agile framework called scrum to maximize our productivity (More info on scrum at http://scrummethodology.com/). Scrum helps us incorporate all our new innovations into this year’s ROV in the minimum time required. Some of this year’s design additions may include: -Elimination of control and camera wires by use of short distance wifi -Replacement of old security cameras with commercially waterproofed cameras -Integration of a custom printed circuit board -Possible acoustic control At Subsea Rovers we are excited to start a new competition year. Please continue to track our progress as we build our next ROV.

In early May, Subsea Rovers competed in the Aptos regional MATE competition. We placed fifth overall and won first in the product presentation. The day before the competition we were not sure if the ROV was going to remain watertight in the competition pool. We kept finding leaks in our “waterproof” tube. One leak would be found and get fixed, but there would always be another one. The night before the competition we fixed one last leak and hoped for the best. The ROV has not leaked since. We got two attempts at our product demonstration. On the first attempt we were having buoyancy issues, which we fixed in time for the second demonstration. Unfortunately, in the second demonstration the ROV was working great when it suddenly died. It is likely that the there was a bad CAT5 connector which prevented the control signals from reaching the ROV. Our presentation went very smoothly and we ended up getting first place. Our prize was a tour to the MBARI research facility. We will get to go on an ROV launching ship and see professional ROVs and AUVs (Autonomous Underwater Vehicles). We are already planning for next season.

A few weeks ago SSR went on a tour of the FMC Shilling ROV assembly facility. FMC Shilling creates commercial ROVs made for oil rig inspection and maintenance. The ROVs Shilling makes are huge, the dimensions of there UHD-III ROV are, 3.5m X 1.9m X 2.1m, with a weight of 5,600kg and a payload weight of 450kg.