The autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) MACO was developed at the University of Victoria, in partnership with Defence Research and Development Canada (DRDC) as part of a feasibility study. DRDC was interested in investigating the use of an AUV to support rapid deployment of acoustic element arrays. The requirements on the AUV to stop and hover, while triggering a low frequency sound source, lead to the multiple thruster, hybrid design of MACO.

This thesis presents the development of MACO with the primary focus on the AW dynamics modelling and its controller design. The project commenced with the development of the vehicle's mechanical and software systems, followed by the collection of the open-loop experimental data. This data was used to produce drag and inertial parameters, which were used during the dynamics modeling process for each degree of freedom (surge, yaw, heave, and pitch). Next, discrete controllers based on PID, feed forward, and velocity feedback were added to each model dong with discretely represented sensors in the feedback loop. The closed loop responses of each simulated controller were then compared with experimental response data collected during lake testing for model validation. Finally, the overall AUV mission performance was evaluated based on an analysis of path deviation error during sea trials.