A novel crane-like launch and recovery system for multiple USVs: mechanism design, control strategy, and experimental validation
<p>To enhance safety in offshore operations and minimize modifications to the mother ship, an autonomous crane-like launch and recovery (LAR) system is essential for deploying and retrieving uncrewed surface vehicles (USVs). Traditional crane-like LAR systems are typically designed for handlin...
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| Main Authors: | , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Copernicus Publications
2025-06-01
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| Series: | Mechanical Sciences |
| Online Access: | https://ms.copernicus.org/articles/16/273/2025/ms-16-273-2025.pdf |
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| Summary: | <p>To enhance safety in offshore operations and minimize modifications to the mother ship, an autonomous crane-like launch and recovery (LAR) system is essential for deploying and retrieving uncrewed surface vehicles (USVs). Traditional crane-like LAR systems are typically designed for handling a single USV, limiting operational efficiency. This paper proposes a novel crane-like LAR system capable of launching and recovering multiple USVs, improving efficiency and convenience. The system consists of a foldable crane arm, three floating brackets, two configuration control mechanisms (CCMs), and a lifting and lowering mechanism. The design and analysis of the foldable crane arm and CCMs are presented in detail. Furthermore, a vision-guided autonomous docking and recovery control strategy is proposed to enable autonomous docking operations. To validate the system, a prototype was developed, and comprehensive experiments were conducted. The results demonstrate that the system successfully recovers three USVs with smooth and stable motion.</p> |
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| ISSN: | 2191-9151 2191-916X |