Unmanned Surface Vehicles (USV) At-sea Fueling

Weight and space are at a premium for the LCS. Since fuel represents a significant portion of the total weight, USV’s will be launched with partial fuel volume to save weight. This proposal addresses a light weight fuel handling system capable of fueling and re-fueling USV’s from the LCS or other vessels without manning the USV. The technology solution that is proposed here is a Multiple-Input-Multiple-Output (MIMO) control system that synchronizes the relative motions between the USV and the mother ship using the USV control system. VCT is uniquely positioned to provide a solution to this problem with its extensive track record of developing high fidelity hydrodynamic and dynamics simulations for use in control system design and testing. VCT is a leading provider of vehicle control systems for US Navy systems. We have delivered 14 Guidance, Navigation, and Control (GNC) software suites to a wide variety of contractors over the past decade. These systems range in size from the man-portable Nekton 3” Next Generation Countermeasure to the 46” square LExUS UUV and the Cutthroat Large Scale Vehicle (LSV-2).