Development of Actively Steerable In-pipe Inspection Robot for Various Sizes

Abstract

In-pipe inspection robots are designed to remove the manpower and to work in inaccessible situation. This paper describes an in-pipe inspection robot (IPIR) which consist of a fore leg system, rear leg system and a body. The fore and rear leg systems are symmetric and are constructed by using three legs. Three legs of each leg system are arranged at an angle of 120 degree with respect to each other to operate inside a pipe. The springs are put into lower section of legs to operate inside pipes of 230mm to 300mm diameter range. In this paper, mechanical design of all major components of robot is done. Solid modeling of all robot components and its assembly is done in Solidworks 14. Several experiments are conducted in pipes of different diameters and effectiveness of steering mechanism is confirmed. This robot can be used for offline visual inspection of varies pipe elements such as straight pipe, elbows and reducers. Also it can be used to find the defects and place of defects in the pipe. This robot also has wide applications in gas pipelines, water pipelines and drain pipes etc. Also it has wide scope in chemical industries as well as in gulf countries for inspection of oil and gas pipelines.