A robust AUV docking guidance and navigation approach to handling unknown current disturbances

The main contribution in this thesis is the design of a robust AUV docking guidance and navigation approach that can guide and home an AUV towards an acoustic source located on an oriented bottom-mounted underwater docking station, under presence of unknown current disturbances and in the absence of any form of onboard velocity sensor. A Complementary Filter and various forms of Kalman Filters were separately formulated to estimate the current and vehicle positions with strategic vehicle manoeuvres. A current compensator uses the estimated current to maintain the desired vehicle course while under current disturbance. Tagaki-Sugeno-Kang Fuzzy Inference System was designed to realize fuzzy docking guidance manoeuvres. Finally, Monte Carlo runs were performed on a designed AUV docking simulator to evaluate the docking robustness against various docking conditions. Simulation results demonstrated robustness in the designed docking guidance and navigation approach.