A study on a vibrating bristled vehicle for small pipes. Vibration characteristics of the vehicle.

Abstract

This paper proposes a novel type of vehicle, for maintenance and inspection, that moves in pipes using vibrating bristles. The vehicle has many inclined bristles and a rotating eccentric weight. The bristles are set on the vehicle surface and vibrated by the rotating eccentric weight, resulting in a driving force for the vehicle. The vehicle vibration is analyzed using the equivalent spring constant of the bristles and a vibration model. It is shown that the vehicle does not vibrate at small angular velocities of the eccentric weight due to friction between the bristle ends and the pipe wall. At large angular velocities, the circular vibration radius increases with increasing angular velocity. Next, vibration experiments were conducted using a vehicle with 16 bristles in order to clarify the relationship between the circular vibration radius of the vehicle and the angular velocity of the rotating eccentric weight. The calculated circular vibration radius agrees with the experimental results.