In the first 18 months of DexROV, a number of essential activities have been carried out by the consortium - this included system requirements elicitation, development of supporting tools (simulation environment), dissemination channels, and starting the development of core technologies.
In the second period of DexROV (M19 to M36), the main focus of the project was on the development of all major components of the DexROV solution. This included the detailed design of all software components, the manufacturing, unitary assembly, integration and testing (AIT) of individual components, and the progressive integration of outcomes with partners in a preliminary setup in preparation to the first trials at sea (in June / July 2017).
As of M36, most DexROV subsystems were manufactured, assembled, and partially integrated. Over the last period of the project, partners focused their work on the system final integration and testing, prior to (1) the campaign scheduled in May (dry run / dry rehearsal) and then the final validation campaign in June.
The May 2018 dry run allowed to prepare and test the end to end chain of the DexROV setup, and to attempt basic manipulation actions on the target test panel. However a hardware failure occurred with one of the dexterous hand's finger, requiring some repair.
During the June 2018 campaign, the overall setup was deployed to demonstrate DexROV operations at sea. The preparation work required more time and efforts than anticipated, due to technical issues including current leaks in one of the skid's cables. In the last week of the trials, dexterous manipulation actions could be successfully carried out, focusing on valves turning operations. This could be achieved and repeated successfully several times over 2 days in the end of June. The extra effort required to address the unforeseen technical issues however did not leave enough time at the end of the campaign to deploy DexROV in deep sea, as was initially foreseen. Nevertheless the sea side setup of DexROV (skid, manipulators, etc) could successfully undergo pressure tests at 1,300 msw in a dedicated facility, validating its ability to operate in deep sea conditions.
Strong dissemination took place over the project duration, with over 50 peer reviewed conference papers and journal articles published. Strong exploitation was also achieved, with a demonstrator of DexROV being presented at Oceanology International in March 2018, reaching a large community of potential customers. A number of contacts were taken at this occasion. Noticeably, one patent was filed (by SpaceApps), a second one is under consideration by GT, and a trademark was registered by JACOBS.
