A Review on the Prospects of Mobile Manipulators for Smart Maintenance of Railway Track
Source abstract
Abstract
Inspection and repair interventions play vital roles in the asset management of railways. Autonomous mobile manipulators possess considerable potential to replace humans in many hazardous railway track maintenance tasks with high efficiency. This paper investigates the prospects of the use of mobile manipulators in track maintenance tasks. The current state of railway track inspection and repair technologies is initially reviewed, revealing that very few mobile manipulators are in the railways. Of note, the technologies are analytically scrutinized to ascertain advantages, unique capabilities, and potential use in the deployment of mobile manipulators for inspection and repair tasks across various industries. Most mobile manipulators in maintenance use ground robots, while other applications use aerial, underwater, or space robots. Power transmission lines, the nuclear industry, and space are the most extensive application areas. Clearly, the railways infrastructure managers can benefit from the adaptation of best practices from these diversified designs and their broad deployment, leading to enhanced human safety and optimized asset digitalization. A case study is presented to show the potential use of mobile manipulators in railway track maintenance tasks. Moreover, the benefits of the mobile manipulator are discussed based on previous research. Finally, challenges and requirements are reviewed to provide insights into future research.
Source: crossref · Quality: baseline
Research context
OpenAlex topics: Power Line Inspection Robots · Soft Robotics and Applications · Infrastructure Maintenance and Monitoring
SciVX discovery tags are terminology-based. OpenAlex topics are source-provided classifications.
Affiliations
School of Aerospace, Transport and Manufacturing, Cranfield University, Bedford MK43 0AL, UK
Network Rail Limited, Milton Keynes MK9 1EN, UK
Funding
Shift2Rail Joint Undertaking under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program · Network Rail Limited
References (100+)
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