Description
Since 2002, the PI’s group has developed four generations of wall-climbing robots for NDE inspection of civil infrastructure. These robots combine the advantages of aerodynamic attraction and suction to achieve a desirable balance of strong adhesion and high mobility. They don’t require perfect sealing and can thus move on smooth and rough surfaces, such as brick, concrete, stucco, wood, glass, and metal. For example, Rise-Rover uses two drive modules to carry their middle compartment with payload up to 450 N. Ground penetrating radar (GPR)-Rover and Mini GPR-Rover are custom designed to carry a GSSI’s GPR antenna for subsurface defect detection and utility survey on concrete structures such as bridges and tunnels. The robots can also carry other devices such as impact echo and ultrasonic flaw detectors for bridge evaluation. To date, all the robots are remotely controlled to scan concrete surfaces.
This project aims to develop motion control and localization methods to make wall-climbing robots a fully autonomous system with automated inspection process using various NDE devices and sensors, and design innovative mechanisms and tools and integrate them into the robots for maintenance actions.
Location
Rolla, Missouri
Presentation Date
14 Aug 2018, 2:00 pm - 2:30 pm
Meeting Name
INSPIRE-UTC 2018 Annual Meeting
Department(s)
Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering
Document Type
Presentation
Document Version
Final Version
File Type
text
Language(s)
English
Included in
Autonomous Wall-climbing Robots for Inspection and Maintenance of Concrete Bridges
Rolla, Missouri
Since 2002, the PI’s group has developed four generations of wall-climbing robots for NDE inspection of civil infrastructure. These robots combine the advantages of aerodynamic attraction and suction to achieve a desirable balance of strong adhesion and high mobility. They don’t require perfect sealing and can thus move on smooth and rough surfaces, such as brick, concrete, stucco, wood, glass, and metal. For example, Rise-Rover uses two drive modules to carry their middle compartment with payload up to 450 N. Ground penetrating radar (GPR)-Rover and Mini GPR-Rover are custom designed to carry a GSSI’s GPR antenna for subsurface defect detection and utility survey on concrete structures such as bridges and tunnels. The robots can also carry other devices such as impact echo and ultrasonic flaw detectors for bridge evaluation. To date, all the robots are remotely controlled to scan concrete surfaces.
This project aims to develop motion control and localization methods to make wall-climbing robots a fully autonomous system with automated inspection process using various NDE devices and sensors, and design innovative mechanisms and tools and integrate them into the robots for maintenance actions.
