engleski

RJET – 111: Autonomous Mobile Robot for Water Intake Channel Maintenance in Power Plant Cooling Systems

This paper presents a state-of-the-art, highly specialized, autonomous mobile robot for water intake channel maintenance, in power plant cooling systems. Thermal power plant in Plomin (TE Plomin), with a total capacity of 330 MW cools down using sea water which is rerouted via 2.5km long channel shown in Fig.1. Due to the abundance of algae present in the seawater, which spread throughout the channel and clog it, the water flow reduces and the power plant efficiency drops. In present situations, in order to eliminate the clog, the power plant needs to be shutdown, so that workers can manually clean it. The proposed robotic solution isable to clean the channel while the power plant is still operational, providing both money savings and human safety. RJET – 111 is a result of an ongoing collaboration between the University of Zagreb and Inteco Robotics in research and development of mobile robots for hydrodynamic surface treatment. So far this research yielded a modular design of a lightweight mobile robot for hydrodynamic treatment of concrete and metal surfaces [1]. Building upon the results from this project we developed the proposed robot keeping in mind the highly specialized nature of its design, replacing the former modular approaches with a specific design approach. The shier size of the intake channel, and the necessity for the robot to carry the high pressure pump and the power system dictate that both robot's size and mass have to be significantly larger thanour previous, modular designs. Furthermore, robot's construction was tailored for the specific dimensions of the channel, so that its tool fits inside the channel, and its body can drive on top of it and safely navigate, localize and steer throughout its entire 2.5 km long path. Figure 1 R JET 111 design, simulation, construction and real world implementation at the TE Plomin, Croatia The paper presents a detailed mechanical design of the robot that encompasses: 1 degree of freedom high pressure cleaning tool tailored for the channel profile ; differential drive supported with two additional passive wheel pairs ; and body capable of carrying full load of the high pressure pump, power unit, drives, electrical motors and electronics. The design and implementation of necessary electronics for both communication and control is also disseminated in the paper. Finally, we present the control system capable of steering the robot throughout the 2.5 km long channel with centimetre precision, starting from mathematical modelling and simulation, to real world implementation.

Mobile robot ; Autonomy ; Power plant

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