Development of seabed excavation robot with peristaltic crawling

Abstract

Sub-seafloor explorations are important for biological and geological research. Sampling mud is one of the major sub-seafloor exploration procedures. The mud-including mineral resources and marine sediments are potentially valuable resources for future studies. Therefore, we propose a peristaltic-crawling-based sub-seafloor excavation robot for deep sea exploration. This robot consists of three units (propulsion, excavation and extraction units), enabling it to move freely through mud. The excavation and propulsion units are fitted with an earth auger and artificial muscles, respectively. In this paper, we verify the propulsion actuator as the first stage of robot development. First, we evaluate the performance of an oil hydraulic artificial muscle under water pressure. Next, we develop an excavation robot by incorporating a pneumatic artificial muscle into a robot and then experimentally evaluate propulsion and excavation of the robot. We confirmed that the artificial muscle appropriately performs as an actuator for the excavation robot.