An Autonomous Wall-Climbing Robot for Inspection of Reinforced Concrete Structures: SIRCAUR

Abstract

A wall-climbing inspection robot has been designed to climb on safety-critical concrete structures by adhering to reinforcement steel bars (rebars) using permanent magnets to generate the adhesion forces. Simulation and experimental validation have been performed to determine the optimum flux focusing magnet configurations with the robot operating on 30–35 mm of concrete cover over rebars arranged in different patterns. The goal of adhesion force optimization is to be able to carry a ground-penetrating radar (GPR) sensor which detects rebar corrosion, concrete delamination, and concrete cover deterioration. The autonomous robot uses an ultra-wide band localization system and GPR data to control its motion trajectories to avoid regions where there is an insufficient density of rebars. Nondestructive testing (NDT) inspection data acquired by GPR are transmitted wirelessly to a ground station for processing and monitoring by NDT technicians.