SUMMARY High-voltage power cables are important channels for power transmission systems. Their special geographical environment and harsh natural environment can lead to many different faults. At present, such special operations in dangerous and harsh environments are performed manually, which not only has high labor intensity and low work efficiency but also has great personal safety risks. In order to solve such difficult problems, this paper studies the power maintenance robot for insulator string replacement, spacer replacement, damper and drainage plate maintenance; the basic configuration and the operation motion planning have been proposed; and the virtual prototype of the inspection maintenance robots has been developed, and then the mechanical structure of the robots has been optimized by the robot kinematics modeling and analyzed the working space based on the Monte Carlo method. The system platform, operation function, structural characteristics and related key technologies involved in the robot system development were systematically summarized; the deep integration point for the robot technology with big data, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and ubiquitous power Internet-of-Things technologies was also discussed. Finally, the physical prototype of the insulator replacement, drainage plate tightening, and damper replacement operation robot has been developed; several experimental tests on a 220 V live line have been conducted so as to verify the robot engineering practicality; and the main development and future research direction have also been pointed out at last.

In complex smart grid, the power maintenance robot is important equipment to ensure the reliable operation of high-voltage lines and it is a useful exploration to realize high-quality power transmission. In view of the increasingly prominent contradiction between the robot single operation function and the diversification of power grid maintenance operations, additional with the robot weak autonomous operation and intelligent behavior ability, this paper proposes a new configuration of a reconfigurable power robot with terminal functions and its autonomous operation behavior control method for the three typical tasks which are the high-voltage transmission line insulators, drainage plates, and dampers maintenance. Through the analysis and planning of the robot operation behavior, the robot finite state machine (FSM) model in the three operation states has been established. Through the introduction of the state transfer function in the FSM, the automatic switching control between the robot key operation states can be realized, and the robot motion planning can be optimized. The movement and working flow of the robot improve the robot operation intelligence and operation efficiency. Based on this, the robot autonomous operation control system has been designed and the robot physical prototype has been developed for three maintenance tasks of insulators, drainage plates, and dampers. Finally, simulation experiments and field operation tests verify the effectiveness and engineering practicability of the proposed method. Compared with traditional manual control, the autonomous behavior control method can significantly improve the robot operational efficiency and operational intelligence. At the same time, the robot multitask function and autonomous behavior control under different tasks can be realized and the method has strong versatility for different task objects and different line environments. The research and its promotion have important theoretical significance and practical application value for the power system operation and maintenance integration management.

In the above article an affiliation for Wei Jiang was omitted, Wei Jiang's second affiliation is as follows: