Towards safe inspection of long weld lines on ship hulls using an autonomous robot

Abstract

Inspection of ship-hull welds must be carried out in accordance with classification society guidelines during manufacture and when in service. Failure of ship-hull welds can result in the loss of a vessel, loss of life and pollution of the environment. Typically weld lines are inspected using ultrasound NDT techniques which are labour intensive, expensive and often hazardous to operators. To remain competitive shipbuilders and inspection companies need to reduce costs while maintaining or improving inspection quality. Automated inspection can achieve this, but current systems are complex, expensive and not suited to shipyard operation. AWI is a novel robotic autonomous system (RAS) that uses magnetic adhesion to climb ship hulls and autonomously track weld lines while performing ultrasonic scans of the welds. Communication of the inspection data is transmitted wirelessly to the inspector sited remotely. This addresses a key challenge in overcoming the payload limitations of current climbing robots. Therefore, AWI is equipped with rugged, fast and secure wireless communications, which robustly integrates with the robot hardware for industrial service.