Preliminary identification of a dynamical plant model for the Jason 2 underwater robotic vehicle

Reports the experimental identification of a finite-dimensional dynamical plant model for the Jason 2 Remotely Operated underwater Vehicle. The experiments were conducted in collaboration with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution during sea-trials in July 2002. A least-squares method is employed to identify decoupled single degree-of-freedom plant dynamical models for the X, Y, Z, and Heading degrees-of-freedom from experimental data. Performance of the identified plant dynamical model is evaluated by directly comparing simulations of the identified plant model to the experimentally observed motion data of the actual vehicle.