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UWF Students Partner With Naval Surface Warfare Center On RoboBoat
July 1, 2025
A group of four University of West Florida electrical engineering and computer engineering students worked with the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Panama City, on a RoboBoat kit to get more high school students interested and engaged in marine robotics.
Dr. Damion Dunlap, STEM Outreach Manager, Naval Surface Warfare Center Panama City Division, tapped into the knowledge of UWF Hal Marcus College of Science and Engineering students in Fort Walton Beach and shared his vision for a kit for high school students, and one that could be used in competitions. Dunlap oversees STEM outreach to support the next generation of engineers.
“We decided that this project would be an amazing way to help high school students become more excited about STEM in an inexpensive and cost-effective way,” said Ashley Schnaible, who is a computer engineering student in her senior year. “This project gave us the opportunity to explore multiple ways of constructing a functioning RoboBoat kit using materials that students could obtain rather easily. It also gave our team the opportunity to be giant kids ourselves, having fun with the build, designing it essentially like a giant Lego set.”
Through the Fall 2024 semester, Schnaible, along with students Heather Sasser, David Laird and Xavier Frank, and under the guidance of Dr. Jeff McGuirk, senior lecturer of electrical and computer engineering who served in the United States Air Force as a developmental engineer, built the platform, while a group of Florida Polytechnic University students focused on the computer pieces.
After multiple trial and error runs with various designs and materials tested, the UWF student team decided to completely 3D print the RoboBoat in pieces using PLA filament and multiple layers of Flex Seal to ensure waterproofing. After the completion of the print and test for buoyancy, they mounted the necessities such as thrusters and a waterproof case that housed the battery, microcontroller and wires. The kit functions as any RoboBoat would, communicating with an RC remote controller.
For the next several weeks during the summer, Dunlap is working with high school students who earned a paid internship with the Naval Surface Warfare Center Panama City Division on a continuation of the project by taking lessons learned from UWF’s project and building another boat.
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