Design, analysis and innovation in variable radius active screw in-pipe drive mechanisms

Abstract

Modern pipelines are often very long, having bends, branches and even variable diameters. Moving inside such pipelines to perform certain tasks has not been easy. There are various design concepts for traction inside a pipe. Screw drive is one of the concepts for in-pipe traction. This article presents a general description and analysis of available screw drives that have been used for in-pipe drives. The main focus is on the characteristic analysis of a novel variable radius screw drive mechanism that is proposed by the authors. The proposed mechanism is a two-stage planetary gearing system driven by a single motor. Major parameters of the mechanism, including helical angle, pitch and forward velocity, are derived. Furthermore, by conducting a force analysis, it is found that the proposed mechanism has much larger thrust force compared with that of the existing screw drive mechanism. A larger thrust force means that the proposed mechanism can carry more devices, thus perform more tasks inside pipes. To demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed mechanism, thrust force measurement experiments have been conducted.

Driving Mechanisms, Motion, and Mechanics of Screw Drive In-Pipe Robots: A Review

“…The driving wheel of the ASDIR is driven by a motor through gear transmission; this is the largest difference between the ASDIR and PSDIR [17,42]. As shown in Figure 4, the power output from the motor is split by the planetary transmission mechanism to drive the driving wheel directly; this type of robot is called an "ASDIR".…”

“…2019, 9, x FOR PEER REVIEW 2 of 14 Therefore, numerous studies have proposed active in-pipe robots which can travel autonomously in pipelines. At present, these robots are mainly divided into six types: Gravity walking wheel (track) type [9][10][11]; wall-press wheel (track) type [12][13][14][15][16]; screw type [17][18][19][20][21]; inchworm (caterpillar) type [22,23]; walking type [24,25]; and snake type [26][27][28]. Among the active in-pipe robots, the screw drive in-pipe robot (SDIR) has been increasingly researched due to its simple driving (single power source) and numerous advantages [29].…”

Tracked Robot for Cleaning of Pipe

“…The main idea is to help us with hard work. Special case is when robots work in highly dangerous application as munition destroying, nuclear power plant, defensive mine countermeasures [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10].…”

“…Sliding members ( 6) and ( 8) can move on sliding rods (4). Sliding members ( 6) and ( 8) are placed on thin pipe (7) which can move on screw rod (2). Member (6) has inner thread which interacts with screw rod (2).…”

Influence of pipe geometric deviation on bristled in-pipe mobile robot locomotion

“…Dependence of the normal force on bristle assembly angle and free bristle tip displacement in case of bristle length 10 mm 4. International Journal of Advanced Robotic Systems Equation(8) shows that, normal force F N is a function of three variables: bristle mounting angle; bristle length L S ; and displacement of free end of bristle r P .…”