fathom

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Thrusters, accessory rail, battery, depth.

Jordan Rusch
Tue, 21 Feb 2017 17:15:35 GMT

1. What power output is there for the thrusters, 2. How would accessories such as a manipulator get its power and control, 3. Does the Fathom 1 have space for a second battery, 4. Will you pressure test the F1 to grater depths such as 200'? It seems like it could go deeper than 150'. I am going to preorder one soon! Can't wait to explore shipwrecks of the apostle islands! Thanks! Jordan

John Boss
Wed, 22 Feb 2017 02:43:02 GMT

@jr2002, good questions! To answer them in order: 1. The interface for the thrusters is a three-point connection for the three-phase brushless motor housed in the thruster. When the thrusters are drawing 10A each, they produce roughly 1.5 kg's of thrust! Pretty impressive for their small form factor. 2. To power and control accessories, we're working on integrating a simple auxiliary port to the underside of the drone that's essentially a USB connection to the drone's onboard CPU. This will provide 5V power and signal. 3. Becuase of the drone's tiny form factor, there's only room for a single 5200 mAh battery that should provide up to an hour and a half of run time, far surpassing any aerial drone counterparts. 4. We'll be pressure testing the drone until failure, so we'll know it's maximum capabilities soon! We hope to obtain some pretty impressive results in this department! I hope that answers your questions! We can't wait to have you join the Fathom community! - John

Jordan Rusch
Wed, 22 Feb 2017 16:02:20 GMT

Great! Any ideas for building a manipulator? Are you going to be offering one once the F1 goes into production? I want to figure out a way to pass a line through lost anchors to bring the line to the surface. A manipulator would work best, but maybe some sort of a hook would work. Thanks so much for this great support! Jordan

John Boss
Wed, 22 Feb 2017 18:01:02 GMT

@jr2002, I've been playing around with various designs, but haven't come to a final design just yet! One community member brought up a great idea of using a "gravity-hook" style manipulator as well! If you come up with anything during your research I'd love to hear about it!

Jordan Rusch
Wed, 22 Feb 2017 21:58:33 GMT

Okay!

Jordan Rusch
Wed, 22 Feb 2017 22:12:18 GMT

What about a electromagnet? [IMG_1788](//muut.com/u/fathom/s1/:fathom:7U7a:img_1788.jpg.jpg)

John Boss
Thu, 23 Feb 2017 04:43:57 GMT

Interesting... That could certainly work for smaller magnetic objects! The only challenge would be keeping a firm hold of the object on the electromagnet if it was bumped or disturbed somehow. But I love the idea! If you build out a prototype given our specs, I'd love to see pictures!

Jordan Rusch
Thu, 23 Feb 2017 12:46:26 GMT

Ok!