Enhanced remote visual inspection of aircraft skin

Abstract

Visual inspection is the most widely used method in commercial aircraft surface inspection. We have developed a prototype remote visual inspection system, designed to facilitate testing the feasibility and advantages of remote visual inspection of aircraft surfaces. We describe experiments with image understanding algorithms to aid remote visual inspection by enhancing and recognizing surface cracks and corrosion from live imagery. Also described are the supporting mobile robot platform that delivers the imagery, and the inspection console through which the inspector accesses it. We discuss initial results of the image understanding algorithms and speculate on their future use in aircraft surface inspection. KEYWORDS: enhanced remote robotic visual inspection stereoscopic multiresolution ANDI CIMP 1. INTRODUCTION Visual inspection of aircraft is the most widely used method employed for ensuring the structural integrity of an aircraft skin and its substructure. For example, a typical...