Study on a Shooting Device to Support a Wire-Driven Bridge Inspection Robot

• Published in: Kikai Gakkai ronbunshū = Transactions of the Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers Vol. 88; no. 916; p. 22-00081
• Main Authors: OHARA, Masashi, SONG, Hyunwoo, TAKADA, Yogo
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: Japanese; English
• Published: The Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers 2022
• Subjects: Arrow; Bridge inspection; Bridge maintenance; Numerical calculation; Shooting device; Simulation
• ISSN: 2187-9761; 2187-9761
• DOI: 10.1299/transjsme.22-00081

In recent years, the deterioration of many bridges built during the period of rapid economic growth has become a problem. As a solution of it, preventive measures such as visual inspections and repairs by humans have been taken, but these methods have problems in terms of cost and safety. If inspection by robots becomes possible, both of these problems will be improved and it is expected to contribute greatly to the maintenance and management of bridges. Therefore, a number of robots have been developed for the purpose of bridge inspection. The among such inspection robots, wire-driven robots, which have less risk of falling and can perform close proximity or contact inspection, are attracting attention. However, one of the problems with this type of robot is that it is difficult to place the wire under the bridge when there is a river or road underneath it, or when it is very high. Thus, in this study, a shooting device for shooting arrows with attached strings was developed to solve this problem. We then conducted a shooting experiment and confirmed that the device aimed at the target automatically and shot the arrow. In addition, we created a simulation model of an arrow with a string attached to it to obtain information such as the shooting angle of the arrow in advance. Then, the flight trajectory and horizontal flight distance of the arrows were compared between the actual and simulated data, and the consistency was confirmed.