Lucky Murphy Boat announces success in unmanned boat technology

Lucky Murphy Boat's unmanned boat technology, in collaboration with Shanghai Jiao Tong University, was successfully applied in the RIB 860 series.

Based on the comprehensive capabilities and development plans of Lucky Murphy Boat, combined with the technological accumulation of Shanghai Jiao Tong University in Marine equipment, Marine information, Marine communication, and other fields, the research proposed the unmanned boat technology. The technology allows pilots to hand over 90 percent of the boat's control to the computer system.

Lucky Murphy Boat has completed a series of tests of unmanned boats that will allow consumers to go beyond RIB's endurance limits, meaning it can sail further, for longer periods, and into more complex environments.

The autonomous Rigid Inflatable Boat (RIB) 860 has been used to develop and demonstrate innovative technologies that have the potential to make consumer sailing faster, easier, and safer, to take the relationship between man and machine to new areas.

The RIB 860 series can be operated for up to 10 days at a speed of 45 knots while performing the unmanned boat function, completely freeing people from boring driving and enjoying the sea life. Experiments indicated the technology possesses a unique function in taking on complex tasks, supporting advanced dynamic missions, and providing enhanced situational awareness, which enables computer systems in challenging conditions at sea faster and more effective autonomic decision-making. RIB 860 series boats have been pre-programmed with an intelligent model and are equipped with an SOS alarm system, that can locate and alert according to danger.

"This technology represents a huge advance in the interaction between humans and machines, combining complex autonomous technology with human capabilities to overcome many challenges faced in difficult conditions at sea," said Qiu Zhiming, Chief Expert on unmanned boat technology at Shanghai Jiao Tong University. “The boat keeps pilots out of harm's way, while allowing them to respond to the increasingly diverse and often unpredictable situations they face every day, and helps them make faster decisions in complex and ambiguous situations."

It was first launched on an experimental basis in 2020 and completed the experiment in 2021 with the cooperation of Shanghai Jiao Tong University. In 2022, Lucky Murphy Boat plans to gradually apply unmanned boat technology to different types of RIBs.

The Shanghai Jiao Tong University Institute provides an open and comprehensive benchmark testing platform. Testing whether different boats could output specified data as required, receive instructions from the referee, and output specified radar/sonar/optical image signals as required or not. On this basis, quantitative test projects with progressive difficulty were set up in the test area to steadily verify the performance objectives of unmanned boats, test the controlled ability and autonomous operation ability of unmanned boats, and quantitatively compare the performance of different types of unmanned boats.

One average water depth of the test area is more than 15 meters, which can meet the requirements of large-scale surface and underwater intelligent unmanned equipment testing. The other average water depth of the test area is 5 meters shallow, which can meet the testing requirements of unmanned boats with a length of fewer than 20 meters, a width of fewer than 15 meters, and a draft of fewer than 2 meters. The test area was built by GPS and radio base station (Beidou satellite data acceptable), DGPS base station, and is equipped with a high gain antenna, covering a 10 km radius and Angle of 90 degrees sector geographical area, to achieve an accuracy of 10 cm sub-meter offshore precise positioning. It can meet the requirements of functional debugging, performance testing, and intelligent evolution of unmanned boats in various complicated situations.

"We have been working together to develop this unmanned boat technology for the past four years," said Lucky Murphy Boat's Chairman, He. “We pride ourselves on having proven autonomous maritime technology that makes Lucky Murphy Boat a forward thinker in this unique area and will provide a critical advantage at a critical time."