Title : UVic students make a splash with pedal-powered submarine
link : UVic students make a splash with pedal-powered submarine
UVic students make a splash with pedal-powered submarine
Nick Kirmse, CTVNews.ca</span>
Published Friday, June 1, 2018 10:00PM EDT
Last Updated Friday, June 1, 2018 10:27PM EDT
A team of budding engineers in Victoria, B.C. has made a splash, after their submarine qualified for an international competition.
Unlike a conventional submarine, the small craft isn’t watertight or pressurized. And it’s powered by pedalling.
The sub was built by The University of Victoria Submarine Racing Club, a group of engineering students who came together to design and build a human powered submarine.
Design of the craft was completed back in December, 2017, with construction finishing up at the end of April, 2018.
“Just eight months ago this was an idea,” Aiden Massey, the club’s vice-president told CTV News. “And it’s been really cool to see it come to reality.”
With the craft finished, the next hurdle will be getting ready to race.
The human powered submarine will be piloted by Jaryd Middleton, a member of the club and the team’s dive master.
He’ll lay horizontally in the craft with an oxygen tank, pedalling to propel the submarine forward, while a buoyancy system of air pockets throughout the body keep the fiberglass hull from sinking.
It’s a tight fit, with the complex components that steer the sub carefully designed and machined by the club to fit into the slim, hydrodynamic outer shell.
“I thought it was going to be a little more claustrophobic than it is,” Middleton told CTV News. “But you have a little nose dome you can see out of.”
The team recently completed the third test run of the craft, trying to make sure the systems are perfectly calibrated to perform in competition.
The club and their submarine will be put to the test at the European International Submarine Race this July in Gosport, England.
As one of more than a dozen teams from around the world participating, the event sees pilots run their subs through a slalom style course. It won’t just test the speed of their craft, but its ability to manoeuver.
“We’re going to compete against the Germans, the U.K. Navy, the Americans,” Manuel Dussault, the club’s president, told CTV News. “So Canada is going against the best of the world.”
While winning would give the club some big bragging rights, the students say the race is about more than accolades, it’s a chance to show off their skills to the world.
“We spend a lot of time studying engineering, sitting in classrooms, crunching numbers,” Middleton said. “It’s really great to be able get out there and actually apply the knowledge, and make something you can see.”
With a report from CTV News Vancouver’s Melanie Nagy
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