ROV Tiburon Upgrade Discussion

Jim Barry and Dale Graves
ROVUC – MBARI

Friday, September 12, 2003
Pacific Forum – 1:30 p.m.

MBARI’s ROV Tiburon is an outstanding science and engineering platform that has completed over 600 dives since 1997. Tiburon is now poised for a refit to replace obsolete systems, improve reliability, reduce maintenance requirements, and upgrade science capabilities. Simultaneously, MBARI and the ocean science community in general is expanding its focus on subsea technology, with emphases on ocean observatories, including MOOS moorings, and cabled observatories. These new science and technology foci will require considerable support for gear deployment, inter-node cable laying, servicing, and recovery, including ROV capabilities that may not be available with Tiburon’s present configuration. In addition to support for forthcoming ocean observatories, the growing technical demands of expeditionary ROV science and obsolescence of some Tiburon systems have created a juncture for review of Tiburon’s present and potential operational capabilities. 

This review, coordinated by the ROVUC, will attempt to define the operational capabilities that would provide the strongest support for the MBARI’s goals in science, engineering, and education outreach over the next 5-10 years. Several issues must be considered, including payload, cable laying ability, instrument and sensor power & communications, sample/gear manipulation, viewing, operational limits for sea state, navigation, sensors, samplers, ROV control requirements (e.g. hovering), midwater operations, variable buoyancy, and others.  The product of these workshop(s) will be a report providing highlighting operational capabilities and highlighting the importance of these capabilities for various user groups in support of science, engineering, and educational outreach. 

The review will be initiated through a seminar for allhands, highlighting the issues motivating the Tiburon upgrade, a comparison of the present capabilities of Tiburon with other ROVs and manned submersibles, and some options for upgrade or even replacement of Tiburon. We encourage a discussion of issues that should be considered for a Tiburon upgrade during the discussion period following the seminar, as well as continuing dialogue within research, engineering, and operations groups.  A follow-on workshop (1+ days) including participants from MBARI and other institutions will be held later this year, to explore more fully the options available and establish priorities for the Tiburon upgrade.