Structural Design and Mechanical Simulation of the Driving Module for Underwater Pipeline Robot

In order to solve the problems of underwater pipeline inspection and cleaning of marine organisms adhering to the inner wall of pipelines, a new underwater pipeline cleaning robot suitable for 30 meters of underwater pipelines with a diameter of 800-1000mm has been designed. In order to meet the watertight packaging requirements of the motor and T-type reducer in the drive module, a special-shaped pressure chamber was designed in the case where the conventional shape pressure chamber is not suitable. A three-dimensional model of the pressure chamber was established using SOLIDWORKS, and the strength of the pressure chamber was verified using the ANSYS Workbench module, ultimately determining the wall thickness of the pressure chamber. The results show that under a pressure of 0.375MPa, the safety factor of the pressure chamber with a wall thickness of 2mm and a reinforced structure reaches over 1.88. This study shows that compared to conventional pressure tanks, special-shaped pressure tanks with reinforcing ribs can meet the operating conditions of 30m underwater without significant increase in wall thickness.