Abstract:The thrust vectoring technology is becoming a research hotspot for underwater vehicle. Combination of spherical parallel mechanism with propeller makes an approach to the above technology. A new-type of decoupled 2-DOF spherical parallel mechanism was proposed for vectored thruster of underwater vehicle. Based on the screw theory, the degree of freedom was calculated, and the direct and inverse kinematics solutions were obtained by using analytic geometry. The first-order kinematic influence coefficient was employed to deduce the Jacobian matrix. The detailed dynamic model was got by the Newton—Euler equation and hydrodynamic of ship propulsors. Corresponding numerical examples were finally given to verify the effectiveness of all above methods. The proposed spherical parallel mechanism is simple in construction, convenient to control and has good decoupling performance. In conclusion, it shows superiority for vectored thruster in engineering application.