Development of a Semi-autonomous Aerial Vehicle for Sewerage Inspection

Castaño, Ángel R.; Romero, Honorio; Capitán, Jesús; Andrade, Jose Luis; Ollero, A.

doi:10.1007/978-3-030-35990-4_7

Cited by 9 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…A number of studies have managed to demonstrate successful use of drones for reallife applications within confined spaces [12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21]. These studies have conducted missions that require localisation of the drone in the confined spaces for the purpose of mapping or inspection.…”

Section: Research Background 21 Examples Of Drone Missions In Confined Spacesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, the generated map of the environment was only demonstrated in 2D, and the equipped camera was incapable of working under low light conditions. Cook et al [18] used a swarm of three small drones equipped with radiation sensors for radiation source localisation and mapping. They developed contour mapping and source seeking algorithms for indoor flight.…”

Section: Research Background 21 Examples Of Drone Missions In Confined Spacesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Drone-Assisted Confined Space Inspection and Stockpile Volume Estimation

et al. 2021

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The accuracy of stockpile estimations is of immense criticality to process optimisation and overall financial decision making within manufacturing operations. Despite well-established correlations between inventory management and profitability, safe deployment of stockpile measurement and inspection activities remain challenging and labour-intensive. This is perhaps owing to a combination of size, shape irregularity as well as the health hazards of cement manufacturing raw materials and products. Through a combination of simulations and real-life assessment within a fully integrated cement plant, this study explores the potential of drones to safely enhance the accuracy of stockpile volume estimations. Different types of LiDAR sensors in combination with different flight trajectory options were fully assessed through simulation whilst mapping representative stockpiles placed in both open and fully confined areas. During the real-life assessment, a drone was equipped with GPS for localisation, in addition to a 1D LiDAR and a barometer for stockpile height estimation. The usefulness of the proposed approach was established based on mapping of a pile with unknown volume in an open area, as well as a pile with known volume within a semi-confined area. Visual inspection of the generated stockpile surface showed strong correlations with the actual pile within the open area, and the volume of the pile in the semi-confined area was accurately measured. Finally, a comparative analysis of cost and complexity of the proposed solution to several existing initiatives revealed its proficiency as a low-cost robotic system within confined spaces whereby visibility, air quality, humidity, and high temperature are unfavourable.

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Section: Research Background 21 Examples Of Drone Missions In Confined Spacesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Research Background 21 Examples Of Drone Missions In Confined Spacesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Drone-Assisted Confined Space Inspection and Stockpile Volume Estimation

et al. 2021

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“…This review will focus on those operating in confined environments including mines. One such system, developed by Castano et al [7], flies through wet sewage pipes for visual inspection. It is ROS controlled and is able to be deployed from the roof.…”

Section: Confined Inspection Uasmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Design of Prometheus: A Reconfigurable UAV for Subterranean Mine Inspection

et al. 2020

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The inspection of legacy mine workings is a difficult, time consuming, costly task, as traditional methods require multiple boreholes to be drilled to allow sensors to be placed in the voids. Discrete sampling of the void from static locations also means that full coverage of the area cannot be achieved and occluded areas and side tunnels may not be fully mapped. The aim of the Prometheus project is to develop an autonomous robotic solution that is able to inspect the mine workings from a single borehole. This paper presents the challenges of operating autonomous aerial vehicles in such an environment, as well as physically entering the void with an autonomous robot. The paper address how some of these challenges can be overcome with bespoke design and intelligent controllers. It details the design of a reconfigurable UAV that is able to be deployed through a 150 mm borehole and unfold to a tip-to-tip diameter of 780 mm, allowing it to carry a payload suitable for a full autonomous mission.

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“…In UAV-based indoor visual inspection applications, the Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) sensor is the most popular one. In [5], Castaño et al demonstrated a semi-autonomous UAV system for sewerage inspection. The UAV utilised four TeraRanger One sensors to compute its position relative to the pipe longitudinal axis, and the UAV was remotely controlled by engineers.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Stereo Vision-based Autonomous Navigation for Oil and Gas Pressure Vessel Inspection Using a Low-cost UAV

Yang

et al. 2021

2021 IEEE International Conference on Real-Time Computing and Robotics (RCAR)

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It is vital to visually inspect pressure vessels regularly in the oil and gas company to maintain their integrity. Compared with visual inspection conducted by sending engineers and ground vehicles into the pressure vessel, utilising an autonomous Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) can overcome many limitations including high labour intensity, low efficiency and high risk to human health. This work focuses on enhancing some existing technologies to support low-cost UAV autonomous navigation for visual inspection of oil and gas pressure vessels. The UAV can gain the ability to follow the planned trajectory autonomously to record videos with a stereo camera in the pressure vessel, which is a GPS-denied and low-illumination environment. Particularly, the ORB-SLAM3 is improved by adopting the image contrast enhancement technique to locate the UAV in this challenging scenario. What is more, a vision hybrid Proportional-Proportional-Integral-Derivative (P-PID) position tracking controller is integrated to control the movement of the UAV. The ROS-Gazebo-PX4 simulator is customised deeply to validate the developed stereo vision-based autonomous navigation approach. It is verified that compared with the ORB-SLAM3, the numbers of ORB feature points and effective matching points obtained by the improved ORB-SLAM3 are increased by more than 400% and 600%, respectively. Thereby, the improved ORB-SLAM3 is effective and robust enough for UAV self-localisation, and the developed stereo vision-based autonomous navigation approach can be deployed for pressure vessel visual inspection.

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Development of a Semi-autonomous Aerial Vehicle for Sewerage Inspection

Cited by 9 publications

References 9 publications

Drone-Assisted Confined Space Inspection and Stockpile Volume Estimation

Drone-Assisted Confined Space Inspection and Stockpile Volume Estimation

The Design of Prometheus: A Reconfigurable UAV for Subterranean Mine Inspection

Stereo Vision-based Autonomous Navigation for Oil and Gas Pressure Vessel Inspection Using a Low-cost UAV

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