TY - GEN
T1 - Autonomous mobile robots for ultrasonic NDE
AU - Friedrich, M.
AU - Galbraith, W.
AU - Hayward, G.
PY - 2007
Y1 - 2007
N2 - Robotic vehicles are becoming increasingly attractive for non-destructive evaluation (NDE) of engineering structures, particularly for those areas where access is difficult or too hazardous for human intervention. This paper describes the design philosophy and prototype evaluation of a team of heterogeneous miniature climbing robots, which perform a range of NDE tasks, including magnetic flux leakage, eddy-current, visual and ultrasonic inspection. A host computer is used for overall supervision and inter-vehicle communication is achieved using wireless links. Each autonomous robot is located in 3-D space by an ultrasonic positioning system in a listener-beacon configuration and is supplemented by data derived from optical wheel encoders and an on-board gyroscope. Results for non-contact ultrasonic inspection are presented, where the vehicle NDE payload comprises a pair of air coupled transducers, inclined at the appropriate angle to a test plate, for generation and reception of the A(0) Lamb wave. C-scan images are shown, using the vehicle and the local positioning system to provide relative positional information.
AB - Robotic vehicles are becoming increasingly attractive for non-destructive evaluation (NDE) of engineering structures, particularly for those areas where access is difficult or too hazardous for human intervention. This paper describes the design philosophy and prototype evaluation of a team of heterogeneous miniature climbing robots, which perform a range of NDE tasks, including magnetic flux leakage, eddy-current, visual and ultrasonic inspection. A host computer is used for overall supervision and inter-vehicle communication is achieved using wireless links. Each autonomous robot is located in 3-D space by an ultrasonic positioning system in a listener-beacon configuration and is supplemented by data derived from optical wheel encoders and an on-board gyroscope. Results for non-contact ultrasonic inspection are presented, where the vehicle NDE payload comprises a pair of air coupled transducers, inclined at the appropriate angle to a test plate, for generation and reception of the A(0) Lamb wave. C-scan images are shown, using the vehicle and the local positioning system to provide relative positional information.
KW - autonomous
KW - mobile robots
KW - ultrasonic
KW - nde
UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/ULTSYM.2006.241
U2 - 10.1109/ULTSYM.2006.241
DO - 10.1109/ULTSYM.2006.241
M3 - Conference contribution book
SN - 9781424402014
T3 - Ultrasonics Symposium
SP - 902
EP - 905
BT - 2006 IEEE Ultrasonics symposium proceedings
PB - IEEE
CY - New York
T2 - IEEE Ultrasonics Symposium 2006
Y2 - 2 October 2006 through 6 October 2006
ER -