Product Description This is a NAVAL POSTGRADUATE SCHOOL MONTEREY CA DEPT OF MECHANICAL ENGINEERING report procured by the Pentagon and made available for public release. It has been reproduced in the best form available to the Pentagon. It is not spiral-bound, but rather assembled with Velobinding in a soft, white linen cover. The Storming Media report number is A455714. The abstract provided by the Pentagon follows: Future underwater missions will require data transmission via satellite, In particular, the Office of Naval Research (ONR) is interested in experimenting with communications using the GOES satellite system, which is government owned. Unfortunately, communication antennas must point to specific satellites in this system and thus underwater vehicles must steer a specific course on the surface during the communication process, While surfaced, underwater vehicles are subject to wind and wave disturbances and it has been suggested that control using differential thrust from propellers may provide advantages, This thesis covers efforts to create and test such a steering autopilot based on the use of the ARIES AUV and differing the voltage supplied to each propeller, It is planned to use the ARIES in an ocean experiment to test this satellite communication capability, This control is embedded in the control of ARIES during extended pop up maneuvers for GPS navigational fixes, When surfaced, not only are navigational fixes obtained, but also data packets are communicated to a command center, |