Ocean Engineering 114 (2016) 6678

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Ocean Engineering
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/oceaneng

Review

Stabilizing control and human scale simulation of a submarine

ROV navigation
Adel Khadhraoui a, Lot Beji a, Samir Otmane a, Azgal Abichou b
University of Evry, IBISC Laboratory, EA 4526, 40 rue du Pelvoux, 91020 Evry, France
Polytechnic School of Tunisia, LIM Laboratory, BP743, 2078 La Marsa, Tunisia

art ic l e i nf o

abstract

Article history:
Received 10 February 2014
Accepted 29 December 2015

This paper addresses the stabilizing control problem of a Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) expected for
observation tasks in depth sea and marine archeology sites inspections. A stabilizing image must be
ensured throughout the ROV's motion. From the kino-dynamic model we prove that the ROV fails
Brockett's necessary condition. Consequently, the equilibrium cannot be stabilized using continuous pure
state feedback laws. As an alternative, a continuous time-varying feedback law is proposed. In addition to
basic simulation results, a human-scale visualization integrating a 3D aquatic pool environment and the
ROV's 3D CAD model is introduced. The stability results imply the effectiveness of the proposed stabilizing control law.
& 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords:
Submarine ROV
Kino-dynamic model
Time-varying feedback law
Averaging approach
3D visualization
Virtual environment

Contents
1.
2.

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
.........
67
Modelling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.........
2.1. Kinematics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
.......
68
2.2. Dynamics of the ROV. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
......
72
3. Stabilizing feedback law . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
.......
72
3.1. Robustness
72
study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
74
4. Human scale simulation using VR
75
platform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
75
77
4.1. Human scale simulation
setting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.2. Simulation results of the ROV navigation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
......
5. Conclusions and future
work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.........
Appendix
A. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.........
E-mail addresses: Adel.Khadhraoui@ibisc.univ-evry.fr (A. Khadhraoui),
Lot.Beji@ibisc.univ-evry.fr (L. Beji), Samir.Otmane@ibisc.univ-evry.fr (S. Otmane),
Azgal.Abichou@ept.rnu.tn (A. Abichou).

1. Introduction
Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs) and Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs) have been applied in a wide variety of
submarine areas. Recently, there has been a trend to use smaller
autonomous underwater vehicles, both tethered and untethered in

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.oceaneng.2015.12.054
0029-8018/& 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

inspection, mapping or bathymetry. However, we can distinguish a

depth limit for different types of existing autonomous underwater
vehicles. We can cite the Hugin 3000 sensor of Kongsberg Marrivers, lakes and oceans. Called also underwater robots, they are an
integral part of scientic equipment to explore the seas and
oceans. Many examples have shown that ROVs and AUVs are

itime, the Sea Oracle of Bluen's Robotics and the Alistar 3000 of
ECA, which can reach depths of 3000 m, and have a high autonomy. An AUV has an important size and weight and requires signicant logistics. They also use a lot of energy which may be

useful in many elds and for a variety of applications such as

A. Khadhraoui et al. / Ocean Engineering 114 (2016) 6678

constraining in some applications. However, the ROVs, as the

Phantom 500 (Folcher and Rendas, 2001), the ALIVE vehicle of
group Cybernetix, the ROV Triton-PR, the AC-ROV (ROV sales) and
the H1000 of the Eca-Hytec, with much less autonomy, they are
dedicated for inspection/observation operations in subsea and are
not considered for manipulations. Underwater vehicles that use
differential thrust for surge and yaw motion control have the
advantage of increased maneuverability. Unfortunately, such
vehicles usually do not have thrusters/actuators to control lateral
movements. Hence, they fall into the underactuated vehicle category. From control point of view, which is the key problem to
ensure vehicle semi-autonomy or full-autonomy, the control
design becomes a challenge problem due to underactuation and
high nonlinearities of the dynamic model. Thus, controlling the
ROV's positions with suitable performance is so difcult due to the
strong model nonlinearities and uncertainties. Several different
control approaches have been studied for underwater vehicles
including sliding mode control cited in Yoerger and Slotine (1991),
robust control in Licea and Grimble (1994) and Han et al. (2011),
adaptive control in Narasimhan and Singh (2006), fuzzy control as
presented by Wang et al. (2003), neural networks of Junku (1990)
and nonlinear control in Nakamura and Savant (2005). The stabilizing problem of underwater vehicles at a desired reference trajectory is an important issue in many offshore applications. This
goal can be achieved by solving trajectory-tracking, path-following, path-tracking and stabilization problems (Do and Jie, 2009).
Robustness of the controller with respect to non-stationary subsea
environments is also a challenging problem. In MartinsEncarnacao (2002), the Lyapunov approach and the backstepping
technique were combined and the control achieves the seabed
monitoring. The tracking control of an AUV was limited to the
horizontal plan in Lapierre and Soetanto (2007). A rst order
sliding mode technique was proposed by Salgado (Folcher and
Rendas, 2001) for the Taipan. Work in Herman (2010) presented an
adaptive control scheme of dynamic positioning of a ROV based on
a variable structure model-reference adaptive control. A selfregulating fuzzy controller is designed for a small cylindrical
object navigating near free-surface to minimize wave disturbance
and to keep the object move in the desired depth based on the
adaptive fuzzy control theory was proposed in Zhiyu et al. (2011).
In Teixeira et al. (2010), a nonlinear Lyapunov-based adaptive
output feedback control law is designed and shown to regulate
pitch, yaw, and depth tracking errors to zero. The integrator
backstepping technique is used to achieve a Lyapunov stable trajectory tracking controller in Aguiar et al. (2003). A control strategy for station keeping of underactuated at-sh type AUVs with
an addition of dedicated thrusters is proposed in Mohan and
Thondiyath (2013). The stabilizing problem of ROVs systems
represents a challenge for nonlinear control theory because the
linearization for most of them is not controllable. In fact, as shown
by Brockett (1983), for this class of systems there does not exist a
smooth and pure-state control law which asymptotically stabilizes
the system to an equilibrium point. As an alternative, explicit
time-varying or a discontinuous laws solve the stabilizing control
problem for a large underactuated autonomous systems (see
Rosier, 1994; Morin and Samson, 1997; Pettersen and Nijmeijer,
2001).
Recently, virtual reality is used to study performances of 3D
interaction tasks in large scale virtual environments (Ullah et al.,
2009) including multimodal HumanRobot Interaction (HRI) as in
Boudoin et al. (2008). Navigation is one of the fundamental tasks
needed for 3D interaction with Virtual Environments. Virtual

67

reality offer the high-end visualization and the realistic physical

behavior of the ROV. Accurate simulations and graphical display of
these virtual environments are being used to impart users with

behavior, virtual reality approaches are applied in many cases. In

2. Modelling

Domingues et al. (2012a), two types of HumanRobot Interface are

developed for underwater robot teleoperation. The rst one is a
Web interface to control and teleoperate the ROV. The second
(HRI) is a web interface on a special aquatic computer called

As submarine vehicle, due to hydrodynamic forces, the ROV

kino-dynamic model is highly nonlinear and coupled, however, to

DOLPHYN that simulates scuba diving (Domingues et al., 2012b). A

(Folcher and Rendas, 2001). These assumptions concern often

virtual telepresence operation approach of tele-operation of

some coupling terms or outright neglect hydrodynamic terms. The

underwater robots using a video camera is described in Lin and

ROV has a close frame structure (see Fig. 1). This vehicle is actuated

Kuo (1997).
In this paper, we study a ROV as an ultraportable submarine

with two reversible horizontal thrusters F 1; O1 and F 2 ; O2 for

simplify the model most of authors introduce some assumptions

will permit the Tele-exploration in mixed-reality sites. It is pro-

surge and yaw motions, and a reversible vertical thruster F 3; O3

for heave motion, where Oi is the center of the force Fi (see Fig. 9).
A 150 m of cable provides electric power to the thrusters and
enables communication between the vehicle sensors and the

cured by the European project Digital-Ocean.1 In order to stabilize

surface equipment (see Figs. 1 and 2), while the ROV character-

the ROV, the submarine system should be stabilized for a given

istics are given in Table 1.

desired position and attitude under hydrodynamic effects. Based

Note that from Table 1, the inertia product terms I xy; I yz ; I xz are
negligible compared to the principal moments of inertia

vehicle, which is expected for observation and exploration in

subsea historical sites. The ROV is equipped by two cameras and

on the ROV kino-dynamic model in Adel et al. (2013), we prove

that Brockett's necessary condition is not satised, hence a continuous linear or nonlinear pure state feedback law cannot solve
the stabilizing problem. Hence, an explicit homogeneous time-

I xx ; I yy; I zz . Then, the inertia matrix is taken diagonal.

2.1. Kinematics

varying control is elaborated. Using the virtual reality tools, we

will visualize the movement of the ROV and operators could per-

An underwater vehicle model is conventionally represented by

a six degrees of freedom, but with fewer control inputs which may

form different manipulations.

The paper is organized as follows: In Section 2 the kinematic

conduct to some uncontrolled directions. Then the problem con-

and dynamic model of the ROV is addressed. In Section 3, a con-

sists to nd the adequate combination of control inputs that

ensure the six degrees of motion. Let us consider two reference
frames to describe the vehicle states, where one being the inertial

tinuous periodic time-varying feedback law is constructed. Using a

virtual reality Platform the 3D simulation of the ROV navigation
under the developed theoretical results are presented in Section 4.

frame R0O; xo; yo; zo and the other being the local body frame Rv

Section 5 deals with some conclusions and future works.

C; xB ; yB; zB with the origin coincident with the ROV center of

buoyancy C. The center of gravity G is vertically aligned with the
center of buoyancy. Surge, sway and heave directions are

realistic experiences. For animation and 3D visualization of ROV

68

http://www.digitalocean.eu

A. Khadhraoui et al. / Ocean Engineering 114 (2016) 6678

Table 1
The ROV characteristics.
Mass (kg)
Maximum speed (m/s)
Dimension (mm)
Maximum depth (m)
Moment of inertia (kg/m2)
Product of inertia (kg/m2)

10.81
3 knots C 1:6
L 450, l 270, H 210
150

Coordinate of G, w.r.t Rv(m)

Buoyancy force (N)

xG; yG; zG 0; 0; 0:16

FB 107
xB; yB ; zB 0; 0; 0

Center of buoyancy C, w.r.t Rv (m)

Ixx 0:065; Iyy 0:216; Izz 0:2

Ixy C Iyz C Ixz C 10 5

Fig. 1. The ROV at 5 m depth.

Fig. 3. The system of parametrization references of the ROV.

Fig. 2. ROV in a small pool tethered by umbilical cable.

where
used:

supported by the Rv-axis (Fig. 3). In the following we introduce

1
0

where T is the transpose,

T1 T2 T A R6. The following shorthand notations are

c cos

; s sin ; t tan :

1 A R3 represents the inertial coordi-

nates G in R0 and 2 A R3 regroups attitudes of the body in R0 with

, and being the roll, pitch and yaw motions, respectively.
Further, the velocity of G in the body-xed frame Rv is taken as

2.2. Dynamics of the ROV

1 u v wTR

2 p q rTR

In this section we will apply Euler's rst and second axioms to

with u(surge), v(sway), and w(heave) being the linear velocities,

and p(roll), q(pitch), and r(yaw) being the attitude velocities with

drive the body equation of motion. Considering the ROV as a rigid

respect to the local frame Rv.

The basic transformation between these velocities is expressed
by

equations that describe the combined translational and rotational

_ 1 J 12 1

mf_ 1

body undergoing external forces and moments, the NewtonEuler

dynamics are given by

2 4 1 _ 2 4 r G 2 4 2 4 r G g 1

_ 2 2 4 I C 2 mr G 4 _ 1 2 4 1 2

where
0

ssc s c

IC

sss c c scs c s C
s

cs

where

cc

The body-xed angular velocity vector 2 and the Euler angle rate

m is the mass,

vector _ 2 are related through a transformation matrix J 22

according to

I C A R33 is the inertia matrix with respect to C,

2 J 22 2

rG 0; 0; zG T is the coordinate of G in Rv, where zG 4 0,

1 A R3 is the external forces and 2 A R3 is the moments of

external forces with respect to C.

where

4 represents the cross vector product in R3 .

0
B

Let

T1 T2 T , the kino-dynamic model can be represented by

the following compact form:

M C D g2 B

For the ROV one excludes an attitude in pitch equal to 2.

The kinematics equation can be expressed in vector form as:
! !
0

_ J2

The details of the model (8) and (9) are as follows:

1 x y zTR

2 TR

cc

scc s s

J 12 @ cs

st
J 2 2

@ AB 0
s
c

J 12
J 22

ct
s C
c

1
2

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