An Inspection Robot for Belt Conveyor Maintenance in Underground Mine—Infrared Thermography for Overheated Idlers Detection

Abstract

It is well known that mechanical systems require supervision and maintenance procedures. There are a lot of condition monitoring techniques that are commonly used, and in the era of IoT and predictive maintenance one may find plenty of solutions for various applications. Unfortunately in the case of belt conveyors used in underground mining a list of possible solutions shrinks quickly. The reason is that they are specific mechanical systems—the typical conveyor is located in the mining tunnel and its length may vary between 100 and 1000 m. According to mining regulations, visual inspection of the conveyor route should be done before it will start the operation. On the other hand, since environmental conditions in mining tunnels are extremely harsh and the risk of accidents is high, there is a tendency to minimize human presence in the tunnels. In this paper, we propose a prototype of an inspection robot based on a UGV platform that could support maintenance staff during the inspection. At present, the robot is controlled by an operator using radio however, we plan to make it autonomous. Moreover, its support could be significant—the robot can “see” elements of the conveyor route (RGB camera) and can identify hot spots using infrared thermography. Moreover, the detected hot spots could be localized and its position can be stored together with both types of images. In parallel, it is possible to preview images in a real-time and stored data allow analysing state of conveyor system after the inspection mission. It is also important that due to radio control systems, an operator can stay in a safe place. Such a robot can be classified as a mobile monitoring system for spatially distributed underground infrastructure.

Thermal Imaging Study to Determine the Operational Condition of a Conveyor Belt Drive System Structure

“…The results which are obtained by means of various measurements can be processed by dedicated software FLIR Tools [13]. Studies on the development of longwall conveyors are presented in works [14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22]-they are part of the innovative development of machinery and equipment [23][24][25][26][27].…”

Autumnal Beach Litter Identification by Mean of Using Ground-Based IR Thermography

“…IR thermal cameras are also installed on aerial (UAV) and terrestrial (UGV) platforms, resulting in effective equipment in terms of time efficiency and timeliness [11][12][13][14][15][16].…”

Damage Detection Based on 3D Point Cloud Data Processing from Laser Scanning of Conveyor Belt Surface

“…Critical case may also lead to fire [17]. To support maintenance procedures, one may use SCADA systems [18], portable devices based on termography [19], vibration measurements [1,2], Internet of Things components [20] or robotic systems for inspection [21][22][23]. Summary on the maintenance of belt conveyors may be found in [24].…”