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Baby Dragon

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General Overview

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Meet Baby Dragon! Desert WAVE's third AUV. She was designed from a NURC (National Underwater Robotics) Kit in 2024. Her original capabilities include using a game pad, pressure sensor and flash light. Desert WAVE upgraded her capabilties to run missions with Dragon such as IVC (Inter-Vehicle Communicaton) and Navigating through the gate. 

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The content on this page documents the individual designs that were implemented, as well as, the testing conducted throughout the development process which upgraded Baby Dragon.

Mechanical

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Magnetic Switch

The team engineered a magnetic switch to activate the AUV Mission Switch on Baby Dragon during competition. This contactless system not only ensures a waterproof and reliable power-up but also triggers a pre-coded mission sequence stored on the programmed Teensy microcontroller, enabling smooth and immediate autonomous operation.

Kill Switch

Desert WAVE engineered a custom kill switch for Baby Dragon. This kill switch was designed to immediately power down the AUV’s thrusters, effectively stopping all motion. It acts as a critical failsafe during testing and competition, preventing unintended movement or potential collisions with divers, allowing for rapid manual or remote shutdown in emergency scenarios—prioritizing both safety and system reliability.

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AUV Door Upgrade

During Pool Testing, it was found that opening and closing the AUV door to upload code poses a risk to the board and components. 

Line-Up Guide

Initial values from the IMU is dependent on the line-up values when turning on the mission switch. 
 

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Mechanical

Electrical

Electrical

NURC Kit Board

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Mainboard

The printed circuit board was designed from a NURC Kit. The team constructed and changed aspects of the board to compete as an Autonomous Underwater Vehicle in Robosub with Dragon. 

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Communication LED

The LED strip was implemented for visual confirmation of Inter-Vehicle Communication (IVC) between Dragon and Baby Dragon. The LEDs can be used for AUV status underwater. Similar to Dragon and Phoenix, Baby Dragon has a "purring mode".

Software Testing

Water-Linked Modem

To enable Inter-Vehicle Communication (IVC), Desert WAVE integrated Water-Linked Modems into their autonomous underwater system. The modem was mounted on their vehicle Baby Dragon and interfaced with a Teensy microcontroller, which handled sending and receiving data. This setup allowed the team to establish reliable underwater communication between vehicles, supporting coordinated missions and shared sensor data.

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Software
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