In the ocean, many marine animals coexist with human-made objects such as boats. Unfortunately, some of these animals, such as Manatees, are exposed to serious risks from conventional propulsion systems.
Spinning propellers, for example, cannot be considered marine-life-friendly, as their rapidly rotating sharp edges can injure or even kill marine animals.
This concern motivated the development of the “Marine-Life-Friendly Boat Propulsion” project, which aims to design a propulsion system that minimizes harm to marine life while maintaining efficient boat operation.
- Methodology used to derive the skeleton model of mechanism
- Inspiration: The design was inspired by the natural arm motion of a turtle.
- Design: A base image of a turtle was imported into the Math Illustration software to closely trace the turtle’s motion. To achieve the desired movement, three key positions of the mechanism were constructed. A corresponding mechanical system was then developed to replicate this motion. A video of the mechanism in Math Illustration is shown above on the right.
- Refinement: The dimensions of each linkage segment were adjusted to better approximate the kinematics of the turtle’s arm.
2. SolidWorks Motion model of full mechanism
Please download through this Link.
3. A video of working model in SolidWorks motion
(This is mp4 file for display. avi format is available here.)
4. A video of the organism whose propulsion method inspired my design