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Members of the Reconnaissance and Amphibious Raids product
management office at Marine Corps Systems Command took to the warm
waters of Lake Anna in Spotsylvania, Virginia, to test potential
upgrades to the Diver Propulsion Device July 18, 2016.
The
DPD is an underwater motorized device used to extend the range of
Marine combatant divers during amphibious missions, and has been a
Marine Corps program of record since 2005. A single system can
transport two divers nearly four miles at two knots. In efforts to
constantly improve gear and equipment fielded to Marines, the RAR
Team is considering upgrades that will make the submersible vehicle
faster and easier to control.
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July 18, 2016 - U.S. Marine Corps Master Sgt. Brad Colbert,
project officer for small craft and special projects with
Reconnaissance and Amphibious Raids at Marine Corps Systems Command,
describes the dive course to a Marine diver at Lake Anna in
Spotsylvania, VA. Colbert and other members of the RAR team worked
with several local Marine combatant divers to conduct tests of
potential upgrades to the Diver Propulsion Device to improve its
speed and controllability. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Monique
Randolph, MCSC)
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“Although [the DPD] has been out in the fleet for 10-plus
years, a lot of Marines don't use it because it doesn't
perform the way they want it to,” said Jake Feeney, lead
engineer for boat and dive equipment in RAR. “By putting the
upgrades out there and saying, ‘This isn't the DPD you're
used to; this is something better,' we'll hopefully get them
back to using it and training on it.”
In the past,
Marines have encountered difficulties with the stability of
the DPD, and when making changes in depth and direction. To
address the issues, the team tested an upgraded DPD that
uses a more powerful brushless motor and a new configuration
for the bow planes, which are small metal panels on the
front that help the DPD driver change depth. A simple
modification to how the planes connected to the device made
it more stable and controllable, Feeney said. The motor is
the biggest upgrade to the system.
“The current DPD
has a brushed motor, but it's inefficient and the brushes
wear out over time,” he said. “The brushless motor is more
efficient and powerful, so we get more battery life out of
it and about 40 percent more thrust.”
A new
open-propeller, or prop, will also make the DPD more
reliable and easier for the operating forces to maintain.
“We were having issues with sticks and debris
getting caught in the closed propeller, which would cause
the engine to shut down,” Feeney said. “The company that
makes the DPD had an open prop version, but they told us it
may cause a performance hit of about 10 percent.”
During the testing at Lake Anna, the team wanted to assess
whether a slight drop in performance was a reasonable tradeoff for
increased reliability in the system.
“We were expecting the
same or a little worse [performance] than with the closed propeller,
but based on my initial [findings], it's actually a little bit
faster,” Feeney said.
Speaking of speed, the RAR team is
also developing a table of ranges to provide to the fleet so Marines
know how fast and far they can expect to travel on the DPD based on
the number of Marines using it, and the configuration of gear they
are carrying, he said.
Several reconnaissance Marines from
the National Capital Region participated in the feasibility test,
which was two-fold, also allowing them to get necessary
requalification training at a location close to home.
“The Marine Corps requires us to do a certain amount of diving,
and if not for events like these, Marine divers in the NCR would
have to reach out to units on the east or west coast to host them
for requalification dives,” said Master Sgt. Brad Colbert,
reconnaissance Marine and project officer for small craft and
special projects in RAR. “It's a win-win. It gives MCSC a pool of
qualified divers to draw from for testing and evaluating new diving
equipment, and it gives the Marines a convenient place to maintain
their diving proficiency and pay.”
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July 18, 2016 - Navy Diver First Class Jason Young (center), Marine
Corps Systems Command diving officer with Reconnaissance and
Amphibious Raids, gives a safety briefing prior to a dive at Lake
Anna in Spotsylvania, Va. The RAR team worked with several Marine
combatant divers to conduct tests of potential upgrades to the Diver
Propulsion Device to improve its speed and controllability. (U.S.
Marine Corps photo by Monique Randolph)
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Lake Anna is a prime location for the maneuverability and
speed tests necessary to determine if upgrades are feasible
for the DPD system. The divers swam a box-shaped course,
alternating between depths of 10 and 20 feet every four
minutes. The course was designed to have the Marines make
changes and turns in direction and speed to test how easily
the DPD recovered, and to determine if the upgraded system
corrected stability issues Marines noted with the current
DPD.
“This was the capstone test in our test and
evaluation plan; it was a final confirmation that the
upgraded systems we've been looking at do exactly what we
hoped they would,” Colbert said. “What's next for us is to
upgrade a number of the systems so the operating forces have
a more efficient system. This is part and parcel of what we
do at MCSC. We identify a gap, find a material solution,
test alternatives, select the right one and then we field
it. For us, this was a win.”
Reconnaissance and Amphibious
Raids is part of Infantry Weapons Systems, the MCSC program office
that develops, tests and fields equipment from weapons and body
armor to boats, parachutes and underwater gear.
By Monique Randolph, Marine Corps Systems Command
Provided
through DVIDS
Copyright 2016
The U.S. Marines
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