DIY Underwater ROV: How to Build and Design Your Own

Building Your Own Underwater ROV: Weekend Submarine Explorer

Most people assume that exploring underwater with a camera-equipped robot requires a research grant or a marine engineering degree. It doesn’t. The core technology inside a professional ROV — a sealed housing, a few motors for thrust, a tether, and a camera — is simple enough to replicate with parts from a hardware store and a weekend of your time. This isn’t a niche hobby either: it’s a decades-old DIY movement with its own history, from a garage-built submersible in 1983 that ended up filming shipwrecks and appearing in a Hollywood film, to today’s open-source platforms with global communities behind them. Whether you’re trying to see what’s living at the bottom of your local lake, teaching a kid about buoyancy and electronics, or just scratching an engineering itch, building your own ROV is one of the more accessible “impossible-sounding” projects out there.

What makes it realistic for a beginner is the layered on-ramp the community has built over the years. You can start with a $30–$150 PVC-and-bilge-pump build designed for classrooms, work your way up to a $400 camera-equipped explorer, and eventually graduate to brushless thrusters, Raspberry Pi video streaming, or full Blue Robotics components — all using designs, parts lists, and forums that other builders have already documented and refined. Below are the best starting points, organized by where they fit in that progression.

BUILD GUIDES & CURRICULA

• SeaPerch (MIT Sea Grant) — seaperch.org — Free, well-illustrated build guides originally designed for classrooms, including the SeaPerch II Arduino sensor modules. Used by hundreds of teachers across more than a dozen states.

• Utah Underwater Robotics — $30 Hardware Store ROV — utahrov.org — A bare-bones build with full videos and a parts list sourced from Lowe’s and Home Depot.

• NOAA Monitor National Marine Sanctuary — ROVs in a Bucket — monitor.noaa.gov — A no-soldering, under-$125 design built around PVC pipe, bilge pumps, and speaker wire. Originally created for grade-school students, which makes it one of the clearest entry points available.

• Science Buddies — Arduino ROV — sciencebuddies.org — A $100–$150 build using a food-container hull and an Arduino UNO for control, with complete wiring diagrams.

COMMUNITY HUBS & FORUMS

• HomeBuiltROVs.com — homebuiltrovs.com — The long-running heart of the DIY ROV world: build galleries, forum threads, and hard-won lessons from builders worldwide, including the more advanced “Albie” 3D-printed ROV project and ballast-tank designs.

• Blue Robotics Community Forums — DIY ROVs section — discuss.bluerobotics.com — Active discussion threads covering everything from acrylic-hulled water drones to scratch builds for student projects. A good place to ask questions once you’re past your first prototype.

• OpenROV / Open Explorer — openexplorer.com — An open-source telerobotics submarine project that grew into a global DIY community across more than 30 countries, with documented builds and expedition write-ups.

• ScubaBoard — DIY ROV threads — scubaboard.com — Diving-community discussions on amateur ROV builds, often from people building rigs to scout dive sites before getting in the water themselves.

COMPONENTS FOR LEVELING UP

• Blue Robotics — bluerobotics.com — The source for T100/T200 thrusters and the ArduSub autopilot firmware that serious hobbyists graduate to after their first PVC build. They also publish open component designs and a build-focused “Learn” section.

• PhilipMcGaw.com — philipmcgaw.com — A personal build log detailing how to add a Raspberry Pi Zero W and live video streaming over an ethernet tether — a popular next step after a basic camera mount.

REFERENCE & TECHNICAL BACKGROUND

• IEEE Spectrum — Build Your Own Undersea Robot — spectrum.ieee.org — A technical look at motor sealing, pressure housings, and oil-filled thrusters, useful once you start pushing past 50-foot depths.

• Wikipedia — OpenROV — en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenROV — Background on one of the projects that helped popularize low-cost, open-source ROV design.

Prefer to dive yourself? See our DIY DPV guide to building an underwater scooter.

Start with whichever guide matches your budget and patience level — a Sunday-afternoon PVC build is plenty to figure out if this hobby is for you, and the path to something more capable is already mapped out by everyone who’s built one before you.