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Volume 11
Issue 3
10.3390/robotics11030062
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Article

A Robotic Platform for Aircraft Composite Structure Inspection Using Thermography

by
Amalka Indupama Samarathunga
1,2,*,
Neelanjana Piyasundara
1,
Anuka Iroshan Wanigasooriya
1,
Buddhika Sampath Kumara
1,2,
Vimukkthi Priyadarshana Vithanage
1,2 and
Damith Suresh Chathuranga
1
1
Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Moratuwa, Katubedda, Moratuwa 10400, Sri Lanka
2
Department of Engineering Technology, Sabaragamuwa University of Sri Lanka, Belihuloya 70140, Sri Lanka
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Robotics 2022, 11(3), 62; https://doi.org/10.3390/robotics11030062
Submission received: 1 March 2022 / Revised: 11 April 2022 / Accepted: 9 May 2022 / Published: 15 May 2022
(This article belongs to the Topic Industrial Robotics)
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Abstract

Water ingression is a critical issue in honeycomb composite structures, which could result in catastrophic structural failure. In the aviation industry, they are widely used to manufacture critical aircraft structural components including fuselage, wings, and flight control surfaces. Catastrophic failure of these structures would be disastrous, thus identifying water accumulation in earlier stages of the defect is necessary. The conventional non-destructive testing method is thermography which is performed using handheld thermography cameras by manually accessing the specific areas. This method of inspection has been identified to be a risky, costly, time-consuming, and inspector-dependent technique. This paper describes using a wall-climbing robotic platform that can be controlled remotely to access and perform the inspection on a targeted structural area replacing the manual process. The designed wall-climbing inspection robot onboard a heat pump to stimulate the composite surface to an adequate temperature and, an infrared sensor to feed the real-time temperature data via Bluetooth serial communication to a remote computer system to be processed into a thermal image and evaluated to determine the presence of water. The results obtained from the thermographic sensor are validated with the comparison of the Fluke thermography camera.
Keywords: composite structures inspection; thermography; wall-climbing robot; water ingression; electric ducted fan (EDF) composite structures inspection; thermography; wall-climbing robot; water ingression; electric ducted fan (EDF)

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MDPI and ACS Style

Samarathunga, A.I.; Piyasundara, N.; Wanigasooriya, A.I.; Kumara, B.S.; Vithanage, V.P.; Chathuranga, D.S. A Robotic Platform for Aircraft Composite Structure Inspection Using Thermography. Robotics 2022, 11, 62. https://doi.org/10.3390/robotics11030062

AMA Style

Samarathunga AI, Piyasundara N, Wanigasooriya AI, Kumara BS, Vithanage VP, Chathuranga DS. A Robotic Platform for Aircraft Composite Structure Inspection Using Thermography. Robotics. 2022; 11(3):62. https://doi.org/10.3390/robotics11030062

Chicago/Turabian Style

Samarathunga, Amalka Indupama, Neelanjana Piyasundara, Anuka Iroshan Wanigasooriya, Buddhika Sampath Kumara, Vimukkthi Priyadarshana Vithanage, and Damith Suresh Chathuranga. 2022. "A Robotic Platform for Aircraft Composite Structure Inspection Using Thermography" Robotics 11, no. 3: 62. https://doi.org/10.3390/robotics11030062

APA Style

Samarathunga, A. I., Piyasundara, N., Wanigasooriya, A. I., Kumara, B. S., Vithanage, V. P., & Chathuranga, D. S. (2022). A Robotic Platform for Aircraft Composite Structure Inspection Using Thermography. Robotics, 11(3), 62. https://doi.org/10.3390/robotics11030062

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