Vibration control of an IVVS long-reach deployer using unknown visual features from inside the ITER vessel

Abstract

The In-Vessel Viewing System (IVVS) project assumes that a long reach deployer equipped with a probe penetrates the ITER chamber to perform periodic inspections. By giving the operator the capability and flexibility to examine unplanned targets, man-in-the-loop technology would be very helpful. But vibrations due to the high flexibility of the structure are probably the main problem in such a master-slave mode, which therefore needs the integration of a high level compensation scheme. However the ITER RH equipment will be confronted with strong electromagnetic interferences as well as a cumulated radiation dose up to several MGy. Short of costly developments, these constraints limit the use of dedicated electronics such as accelerometers or strain gauges. Our main idea is to control the vibrational behaviour of the flexible carrier without considering any extra sensor apart from its embedded probe. In this pre-study we propose to use the kind of rad-hardened viewing system already developed for the AIA demonstrator in order to feed an oscillation observer with visual information. The visual data are extracted from the environment without a priori knowledge of the examined scene. Our approach is quite open-ended and can be extended to other flexible systems. Moreover it has been designed to damp the oscillatory behaviour of the arm whatever its origins may be. As a consequence it should yield good performance when vibrations result from a critical trajectory imposed by the operator, from an interaction with the environment, or from internal dynamics of the carried process, e.g. the rotating prism of the IVVS 3D Inspection System. Experimental results validate the proposed strategy.