The use of small-unmanned ground vehicles for Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) has increased enormously due to recent operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. These vehicles provide surveillance and threat neutralization capability while allowing the EOD operator to remain at a safe standoff distance. There are commercially available robotic systems designed for EOD applications that are already deployed in the field and are capable of meeting many of the EOD operators' requirements. However, these systems may cost 100K or more and are currently in short supply due to the high demand seen recently. In response to these concerns, the Naval EOD Technology Division is in the process of developing the Readily Available Maintainable Robot (RAMBOT). This small mobile unmanned ground vehicle (UGV) is constructed using commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) parts, and has a speed of 5 MPH, multiple cameras, wireless communications, and a simple manipulator. The RAMBOT design is specifically tailored to the current threat environment in Iraq and Afghanistan and the use of COTS parts results in a highly supportable and affordable system. The proposed cost of RAMBOT is 12K, one-tenth the cost of high-end commercial systems. The full paper will address the design requirements, tradeoff analyses, and final configuration of the RAMBOT system.
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