Electroactive Polymeric Composite Fin Design for Propulsion of Autonomous Aquatic Vehicles

The main goals of this research were to 1) refine manufacturing processes in order to develop novel soft, highly compliant and efficient electroactive materials for 2) subsequent characterization and integration into a prototype autonomous aquatic vehicle as a visible demonstration platform. Therefore several manufacturing processes to develop active polymeric composites were investigated and refined to create robust and efficient artificial muscle fin actuators. In this effort, several polymer materials, geometric shapes and thickness of the fin were investigated. An experimental static bench-test setup was then instrumented to characterize forward thrust force and evaluate efficient input driving signals to the actuator fin. All characterization data were obtained using a laptop PC-platform LabVIEW data acquisition system. A radio-controlled vehicle utilizing the optimized fin propulsors and all the onboard hardware to generate power and control signals was then designed and tested for optimum forward cruising speed and simple steering maneuver. The results showed that the proposed electroactive fin could be a viable candidate for application in low powered autonomous aquatic swimming vehicles.