Weaving Laser Vision System for Navigation of Mobile Robots in Pipeline Structures

A new laser vision system is proposed for the navigation of mobile robots in pipe environments. This paper mainly focuses on forward recognition of individual T-junctions and elbow pipes to prevent the robots from becoming stuck in pipes. We propose to mount weaving 2-D laser scanners on robots to obtain selective 3-D front-pipe maps. Recognition of T-junctions requires 3-D maps for pipe wall on wheel sides, whereas recognition of elbow pipes requires full-forward 3-D maps. From these selective forward 3-D maps, algorithms for recognition of T-junctions and elbow pipes were developed, utilizing the mathematical approach to describe the pipeline structures. The practicality of the proposed algorithms was validated for several pipe environments, including T-junction, single elbow pipe, and the latter pipe of double elbow pipes.