Our human powered submarine is what is called a “wet” sub, in that there is no pressurized crew compartment. The whole sub is filled with water, and the operator uses a Self Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus (SCUBA).

Because the sub is filled with water at all times, the original hull designers were very concerned with the overall volume of the submarine.  Any extra volume of the sub is extra weight that the operator must push in an attempt to reach top speed. As such, the original hull designers started with a normal cylindrical cross section with hemispherical nose and then removed material to decrease the volume.

In the process of removing this material, they unknowingly created an airfoil that makes the submarine incredibly unstable in the water. Just as an airplane wing creates lift, so too does our hull; making it almost impossible to keep the submarine level at depth during a full speed run.

The ideology of this year’s hull group is to design and build a stable platform on which to operate. Based on this criterion, we plan on creating a fully symmetrical hull that even with a greater volume will enable us to have cleaner runs, while at the same time making the control system design very easy.

Although the symmetry of the new sub is our main concern, we also plan to improve on the operator visibility. Currently, the original submarine has three out of the four windows located on the top half of the submarine. When the operator is lying in the submarine in the prone position, it is awkward for the operator to have to crane his or her neck in order to see out of these windows. Our goal is to place more window space on the underside of the submarine, where it is needed.