Drones are quickly becoming a valuable asset in the inspection industry. They
provide an efficient and scalable solution to obtain large amounts of visual data
while requiring less time and resources than traditional inspection methods. Drone-
conducted inspections are also much safer since they eliminate the need for
operators to be exposed to hazardous circumstances; there is no longer a need for
potentially dangerous inspections involving climbers, scaffolding and rescue teams.
The increase in safety comes hand in hand with lower inspection costs, not only for
the aforementioned reasons but also because drone inspections are faster and
require less asset down time. Furthermore, the increased accuracy and the ability to
perform inspections more frequently, means that problems in the inspected assets
can be detected earlier, thus decreasing the maintenance costs and risks of failure.
There are different types of drones to suit the needs of different inspection sectors.
Drones are a versatile solution since they can carry different payloads and sensors
for different missions. At AI-Inspect we focus mostly on the energy sector, having
ample experience with wind turbine and electricity transmission tower inspections.
The best solution for our clients are multirotor UAV’s, suited with very high
resolution cameras and the possibility of employing multispectral sensors and
thermal cameras.
Drones only cover the operations-side of the inspection. The quality of the
inspection is for most part dependent on the data comprehensiveness, quality and
analysis methods. An asset inspection can result in hundreds of images per asset
and analysing these by hand can take up a considerable amount of time. However,
there are more efficient ways to do the analysis, for example using Artificial
Intelligence technology.
At AI-Inspect we are working on automating the data collecting process but
also the data management, analysis and reporting. The images obtained by the
drones are usually of better quality than what can be obtained by other means.
Most importantly, drones are equipped with sensors which give them an extremely
precise situational awareness so that the inspector knows exactly where each
image was taken from. An inspection of the same asset can be reproduced more
accurately, especially when automatic or autonomous drones are used, increasing
the asset monitoring effectiveness over time.
Both characteristics combined allow for the generation of an accurate snapshot of
the inspected asset condition which contains all the relevant information required
for a damage assessment. The condition snapshot can be updated and compared
with new snapshots as new inspections are performed so that the asset owners and
operators have a clear picture of the state of their assets through time.
With state-of-the-art artificial intelligence tools, we help the inspectors save time
and improve the accuracy of their evaluations by providing a preliminary analysis of
the images that covers the most common and most likely issues. These issues are
automatically annotated by our AI model and presented to the inspector for review.
Once the inspector has gone through the images of the asset, an automatic report
is generated showing exactly the types of damage present and the urgency of
repairs required. The resulting inspection process facilitates informed decisions,
intelligent risk management and planned maintenance of the relevant structures.
We leverage our software skills and the large amounts of data collected to create a
frictionless inspection process, automating the time-consuming tasks and relieving
the inspectors so that they can focus on what they do best.
Are you transitioning to, or planning to transit from manual inspections to more
automated inspections? And are you interested to learn more about drone
inspections and automated data analysis? Feel free to contact us. No strings
attached. We are more than happy to inform you about the possibilities.
good day,
The team at Ai-inspect.