Enhancing Trust Underwater

RTsys, part of the Neotek group, is a French company that specializes in the design and manufacture of passive and active underwater acoustics and Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs). The 40-strong team of seasoned engineers is headquartered at an exclusive R&D facility in Brittany, with direct access to the Atlantic Ocean for sea trials and FATs.

Ongoing investments in R&D have culminated in a range of cutting-edge equipment widely used in the defense sector (MCM and ASW) and among the marine scientific community (IFREMER, KIOST, SHOM, DSO), as well as the offshore energy and aquaculture industries.

Every RTsys product comes equipped with an electronic board reference SDA® (Synchronous Data Acquisition), a proprietary technology that enables the company to provide genuine turnkey solutions without the need for third-party suppliers.

Today, the company’s portfolio comprises four business lines: AUVs, PAM, MCM, ASW.

AUTONOMOUS UNDERWATER VEHICLES (AUVs)

RTsys’ range of AUVs includes two-men-portable units as well as ultra-compact micro AUVs. These powerful, long-endurance vehicles support a wide range of interchangeable payloads—including SSS (both 2D and 3D image data), CTD and any other water quality sensors—while the INS and DVL enhance navigation to an accuracy of less than 5 meters. These are just some of the features that have made the COMET-300 and NemoSens AUVs popular among scientific, commercial and military operators for seabed mapping, cable and pipeline tracking, coastal water quality monitoring, windfarm inspection, marine, UXO detection, and MCM operations.

COMET-300 (AUV) and NemoSens (µAUV)

Not only are µAUVs the easiest underwater vehicle to transport, deploy and recover, but they represent the most cost effective AUV platform and so increasingly attractive among universities and research institutes conducting biological studies, water, CTD and O² monitoring, seabed mapping, acoustic survey, and more.

Micro AUVs can be launched and recovered by one person, from shore or small boat (zodiac, RHIB) without the need of a dedicated LARS (Launch And Recovery System).

Larger AUVs, however, can incorporate greater battery and payload capacity to extend mission duration and support broader sensor suites. The development and launch of COMET-300—released in 2015—has proven instrumental to the engineering of NemoSens and has afforded the RTsys team with a unique understanding of the market dynamics and opportunity that exist in the AUV industry.

The international AUV market is a mature one these days, but price is still an issue for many potential customers. And so, R&D efforts at RTsys have been geared towards bringing down overall costs. Open software architecture allows users to easily integrate new payloads without having to send the AUV back to RTsys, leaving operators empowered to test and master new applications for their hardware without third-party assistance. Operators can fully customize navigation, although some safety parameters cannot be changed in order to preserve the AUV’s integrity.

Finally, COMET-300 and NemoSens both incorporate a unique capacity for underwater communication based on RTsys’ own protocol.

That protocol—which is compatible with the whole RTsys product range—includes both underwater communication and sparse LBL. This technology allows for a real-time follow-up of the AUV positioning, with transmission of status info, as well as data sample.

It also offers the possibility to enhance repositioning features, leading to a constant positioning accuracy of 5 meters over the whole deployment, even for an AUV not equipped with a DVL.

PASSIVE ACOUSTIC MONITORING (PAM)

RTsys is leading manufacturer of acoustic recorders, buoys and software for both post-processing analysis (up to 180 days autonomy) and real-time assessment, and the company’s PAM solutions address 3 fundamental needs: Long-term analysis, Real-time monitoring, Multiparameter studies.

From post-processing (recorders) to real-time monitoring (buoys) and multiparameter assessments (stations), RTsys provides a wide range of solutions to marine biologists and PAM operators.

The acoustic monitoring and recording combined with multiparameter sensor logs offer the best package fora a wide community of users, from Marine Renewable Energy installation (vessel traffic noise monitoring) and pile driving (noise and environmental impact assessment) to scientific users looking to monitor ambient noise and water quality.

RTsys also specializes in 6000-m depth multiprotocol dataloggers with up to 12 sensors capable of working simultaneously to support various protocols (RS232, RS485, Ethernet, Video, and more.)

MINE COUNTERMEASURES (MCM)

RTsys also provides EOD Divers and Special Forces with a range of AUVs and diver-held navigation and sonar systems to optimize operational efficiency and safety during MCM missions. SonaDive is designed to aid diver navigation and underwater object detection. The embedded navigation system relies on several sensors: INS, DVL, pressure sensor, and a deployable floating GPS. The native acoustic communication, thanks to the Sparse-LBL technology, ensures constant navigational accuracy (less than 5 meters, like the AUV range). Divers can communicate amongst themselves and with the surface in real-time via the acoustic modem, with a range of more than 2 km (up to 5 km using RTsys relay beacons).

Sonar and navigation data are recorded, allowing for mission replay, data analysis and export. With 6 hours of battery life, endurance can be extended by swapping batteries during a mission.

ANTI SUBMARINE WARFARE (ASW)

RTsys produces specialist acoustic systems for at-sea testing and training, torpedo firing exercises and acoustic signature measurements. The SIERA system offers the most reliable solution for the characterization and calibration of underwater acoustic systems (hull-mounted sonars, dipping sonars, variable depth sonars, buoys), while SEMA can act as an autonomous and recoverable acoustic target for ASW training. Easy to deploy from both a RHIB or a frigate, the navigation route is plotted with either waypoints or segments. Different types of training modes such as passive, active and combined acoustics can be programmed. SEMA is easy to operate and recover and is reconfigurable in one hour with a spare battery.

For more information, visit: rtsys.eu

This story was originally featured in ON&T August 2021. Click here to read more.