Issue 45 | Uncrewed Systems Technology Aug/Sept 2022 Tidewie USV Tupan | Performance monitoring | Bayonet 350 | UAVs insight | Xponential 2022 | ULPower UL350i and UL350iHPS | Elroy Air Chaparral | Gimbals | Clogworks Dark Matter

48 A s awareness of autonomous solutions grows among potential customer markets, some among them have begun to feel that UGVs have key benefits over UAVs in low-altitude or indoor applications. For example, UGVs don’t need to hover for close-up inspections (and thus use far less battery energy), they produce far less noise when working among people, and they pose much less of a collision risk in close quarters, especially given their lack of spinning, possibly exposed rotor blades. UGVs could also have similar advantages over AUVs in some circumstances. Shallow waters in particular pose a risk of beaching or rock collisions – even to micro-AUVs – and much like UAVs, conventional AUVs expend considerable energy in station-keeping for stationary inspection, geophysical surveys and border monitoring tasks. If a UGV could be built to traverse the beds of shallow waters and station-keep in their strong currents, it would be able to carry out various jobs with far greater safety and energy efficiency than AUVs. That is the idea behind the autonomous underwater ground vehicles (AUGVs) from Bayonet Ocean Design a UGV that can do the work of UAVs and AUVs in shallow waters, and this is one result. Rory Jackson reports In at the shallow end August/September 2022 | Uncrewed Systems Technology The weight and design of the Bayonet 350 allows it to remain stable in waters that would play havoc even with professional human divers (Images courtesy of Bayonet Ocean Vehicles)