A Robot-Assisted Large-Scale Inspection of Wind Turbine Blades in Manufacturing Using an Autonomous Mobile Manipulator

Abstract

Wind energy represents the dominant share of renewable energies. The rotor blades of a wind turbine are typically made from composite material, which withstands high forces during rotation. The huge dimensions of the rotor blades complicate the inspection processes in manufacturing. The automation of inspection processes has a great potential to increase the overall productivity and to create a consistent reliable database for each individual rotor blade. The focus of this paper is set on the process of rotor blade inspection automation by utilizing an autonomous mobile manipulator. The main innovations include a novel path planning strategy for zone-based navigation, which enables an intuitive right-hand or left-hand driving behavior in a shared human–robot workspace. In addition, we introduce a new method for surface orthogonal motion planning in connection with large-scale structures. An overall execution strategy controls the navigation and manipulation processes of the long-running inspection task. The implemented concepts are evaluated in simulation and applied in a real-use case including the tip of a rotor blade form.

Mobile Manipulators in Industry 4.0: A Review of Developments for Industrial Applications

“…Prior to casting, the approach displays the fiber structure in three dimensions to show any abnormalities and improve the stacking and flow of the fibers. To enable more precise quality control than is now achievable, the IAAM is in charge of creating a transportable measurement system for large-scale components used in the production of wind turbines [35]. Mirror reflectivity measurement at the VALLE energy plant by MAINBOT adopted from [34].…”

A general mobile manipulator automation framework for flexible tasks in controlled environments

“…Coverage path planning is a type of path planning problem, which aims to determine a collision-free trajectory that uniformly passes through all points of an area or volume of interest while minimizing travel time, energy, and other costs (Galceran and Carreras, 2013). Manufacturing applications that require coverage over a specific area of interest include painting (Chen et al, 2020), grinding (Lv et al, 2020), and inspection (Engemann et al, 2021).…”

Special Issue on Advances in Industrial Robotics and Intelligent Systems

“…An interesting study reports a mobile manipulator unified framework for motion planning considering joint limits, joint velocity limits, self-collisions, and singularities [1]. A novel path planning strategy for the autonomous navigation of a mobile manipulator operating in inspection processes is proposed in [2]. A mobile manipulator, which operates as a healthcare and domestic assistant, demonstrated its capability to perform generic service tasks in non-standardized healthcare and domestic environments [3].…”