4.Tank Experiment of a Seabed Walking Platform Model for Subsea Mining Exploration

Keisuke Watanabe
Department of Marine Science and Ocean Engineering, Tokai University, 3-20-1 Orido Shimizu-ku, Shizuoka, 424-8610, Japan.
pp. 326–330
ABSTRACT
In the near future, deep-sea mineral resource development will be possible to be commercialized. To minimize the CAPEX of the project, estimation of deposit quality is critically important and exploratory drilling is indispensable for estimating the amount of resources. To reduce the cost of exploratory drilling, we are going to develop a system of seabed drilling which can move on the seabed by itself without a support vessel on the sea. This exploration platform must be able to move along with the undulations of the seafloor and have a structure that supports the reaction force of the drilling. The authors have been studying an eight-legged drilling platform. This paper introduces our tank test system and some results of tank experiment.

ARTICLE INFO
Article History
Received 25 November 2021
Accepted 06 November 2022

Keywords
Deep sea mining
Exploration phase
In-situ drilling.
Sea bed walking robot

JRNAL9404

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