Meshing and Insulation Strategies for Shelled UAVs in Proximal Inspection of Distribution Utility Lines

Abstract

Aerial robotics brought breakthroughs in inspection across various industries. Power utilities recently adopted drone technologies for visual inspection of their assets. In the cluttered environments of distribution-level networks, shelled drones can offer proximal inspection albeit getting in contact with different objects—something that discourages the use of regular drones. However, the available shell designs are yet to account for two environmental factors when implemented in a power distribution network. First, relatively smaller objects ( <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">e.g.</i> , transformer bushings) pose a risk of intrusion through the shell. Second, the shell may cause unwanted current flows ( <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">e.g.</i> , arcing and faults). In this study, meshing and insulating strategies for an existing C <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"><tex-math notation="LaTeX">${^{6}0}$</tex-math></inline-formula> shell design were introduced. Specifically, the modifications introduced are (i) by weaving a nylon mono-line mesh around the shell to improve its strength and increase the chance of blocking external objects, and (ii) by coating the shell with insulation to prevent the shell from conducting electricity. It is observed that meshing significantly reduces entry areas for external objects. The experiments also confirm the significant improvement in strength due to meshing while incurring a minimal increase in the shell’s weight. The effectiveness of the insulation cover is also verified through an insulation test. To verify the performance of the proposed strategies, a prototype shelled UAV unit is developed and is used in the aerial inspection of a simulated pole-mounted transformer.