Abstract
Marine animals skillfully swim in various flow fields by controlling thrust force, providing an opportunity to learn engineering technology. Oscillating propulsion mechanism such as sea-turtle's swimming motion is safety compared with a screw propeller, and we proposed the sea-turtle robot to use in educational activities to encourage engineering or science for school children. In this study, we developed simple sequential controlled sea-turtle robot for educational use at low cost. In this paper, we first discuss the educational effectiveness from questionnaire data. Then, simple amphibious sea-turtle robot was developed to achieve further improvement of educational tool for various age groups. Developed robot at low cost has sequence controlled three DC-servo motors and it could slowly shuffle forward motion using front flippers. And swimming speed was estimated about 20cm/s.
