Last December the European Union launched a project called TRACT. The project, which now encompasses a number of companies and research centres, has been initiated to develop the robotic inspection of various different types of pipes, which is to include complex branched pipe systems, to enable quantative measurements about those systems without having to temporarily close them down. A 3D printed prototype being developed for this project – a robot that looks something like a cross between an motorised eel and a mechanical water snake – has been of great use to the project and it’s developers.
The TRACT project has brought together a variety of companies and research centres such as Norwegian municipalities and research partners both in Norway, Italy and Spain and overseas. One of the ventures involved is Breivoll Inspection Technologies, a very small company with just five employees, that is, however, highly notable.
Lars Brenna at Breivoll told Phy.org: “Inspections of this kind are among the most difficult operations we have to carry out in the water distribution sector. But we expect that the concept being developed today will be able to resolve some of the problems we have yet to tackle. In Norway, poor quality water pipes are responsible for drinking water losses of between 30 – 40%, so it’s essential that we come up with innovative solutions. Since this problem is also universal, Breivoll as a company is also aiming to develop a global market for the TRACT concept.”
Breivoll is working with Det Norske Veritas to use the small company’s research into advanced ultrasound – using some sixty-four large ultrasound transducers to calculate the thickness of, and corrosion in, pipe systems – to develop the long, thin, propeller-driven robot. SINTEF ICT and industrial design firm Inventas are responsible for the R&D of the mechanical design of this robot. Inventas has 3D printed a complex model of the robot, which has been tested in a water-filled pipe.
Mr. Johansen iterated that the majority of current pipe inspection units are wheel driven, or belt driven. These approaches can cause contaminant particles to be loosed from the bottom of the pipes. The new robotic system instead uses propellers the front and reverse alongside ‘fins’ contact the wall of the pipe. The robot moves through a pipe, and at junctions probes for the correct path, then fulfilling a requisit for flexibility by bending and continuing along the correct path. Ultrasound signals contact with the walls of the pipe, bouncing back data about the pipe’s wall thickness. For measurements along an entire length of the pipe the robot must be able to rotate, Inventas have solved this problem by utilising locked joints at each end of the robot.
Project TRACT will be completed next year, thanks, in part, to the complex prototyping capabilities of 3D printing.
