Planktonic Mining Car Design Of Its Operation, Process Simulation Study

The topic comes from the 15th deep-sea development project of the Ocean Mineral Resource Research and Development Association of China. And the Remotely Underwater Operated Vehicle (ROV) is one of the four kinds of walk mechanism for the cobalt-crust mining. The stability and work status of a ROV in the cobalt-crust mining is studied by using virtual prototype technology and multi-body dynamic simulation method in the paper.A ROV project design is executed in the paper. And the mechanical system model based on the project design is built in the paper. Then the force model of the mechanical system is analyzed, and the simplified dynamic model of the vehicle is built. On the base of the simplified dynamic model, the virtual prototype model of the vehicle is built by using multi-body dynamic simulation analysis software ADAMS. The landing process, work process in the plane, over obstacles and ravines process, work process on slopes are simulated. In order to find out the possible factors in effecting the performance of the mining vehicle, the hose force, advance thrusters, and the trim angle of the vehicle are analyzed by simulating. And the result is as follows.Firstly, the main factor in effecting the performance of the mining vehicle is the hose force, advance thrusters, and the trim angle. If the force between the Vehicle and the hose is strong, the cutting head can't peel off the cobalt crust from the base rock. Because the effect between the cutting head and ground is very strong, the velocity of the vehicle is restricted by it, but the velocity decreases quickly, as the reversed propelling forces of the advance thrusters are generated. The trim angle of the vehicle affects the task of the cutting head. If the trim angle is big enough, the cutting head also can't peel off the cobalt crust from the base rock. If there is no effect of landform, the vehicle can work steadily.Secondly, there are collisions between the cutting head and the ground, when the vehicle lands, and it is possible that the collisions will effect on the safety and performance of the instruments on the vehicle. AABSTRACTnature landing method is presented to reduce the collisions, but the landing will need much more time.Lastly, there are collisions between the cutting head and the ground, when the vehicle passes obstacle or ravines, when the nature landing method is adopted, the collisions are greatly reduced, but the time using to pass increase greatly. So there is the minimum distance of passing obstacle or ravines, which restricts the vehicle's fitting the landform.The result, in the paper, is useful at the feasibility demonstration of the vehicle using for deep-sea cobalt-crust mining, and the research of ROV.