Accessing subsurface utilities buried beneath a roadway can sometimes be a two or three-day effort involving multiple lane closures and heavy equipment. Looking to minimize that scenario and to accelerate an ongoing overhaul of the U.K.’s second-largest gas distribution network, gas utility SGN has been investing in the development of the autonomous RRES roadworks robot from ULC Technologies.

RRES是机器人道路工程和开挖系统的缩写，是一个独立的电池供电机器人，可以自主执行位于铺装道路下方的挖掘，维修和重新燃烧气管所需的复杂任务。现在在英国进行了春季和夏季的试验，SGN和ULC将RRES视为各种地下公用事业的未来工作平台。

“It enhances safety for us,” says Ollie Machan, SGN’s project lead for RRES, during a demonstration the robot for industry press on April 13. “For the first time, this is a fully autonomous robot operation, totally hands off.”

除了一对人类操作员时，还要关注机器人并在过程中移动不同步骤时更换工具推车，人类的互动也很小，Machan说，这是对安全性的巨大促进。“ RRE将操作员从挖掘机中取出，因此，如果燃气或电动发生任何事情，我们已经将它们带出[危险]。”

乍一看，RRES系统似乎很简单。一个带有六个发音的机器人臂位于一个轨道安装的平台上，该平台容纳机器人的锂离子电池组和板载计算机。从附件的工具推车自动换掉了开挖不同阶段的工具。但是，与机器控制的重型设备或复杂的电动工具相比，RRES与众不同的是它的重点是总自治。

“Three years ago we started this project with an ambitious goal,” recalls Ali Asmari, R&D project manager and head of AI and machine learning at ULC Technologies. “To do everything with excavation: identify buried assets, find buried assets and excavate soil above those assets, all with less involvement from a human. The robot can install a fitting on a gas pipe, and once the operation is done, it can restore material into the keyhole [excavation] and cap it.”

Currently a working prototype, the RRES uses a combination of custom tools and some fairly sophisticated AI-based learning to navigate the excavation site and perform its tasks. Able to work in inclement weather as well as on an incline, the RRES begins by assessing the site with a ground-penetrating radar attachment. Once a scan is complete, the RRES generates a point cloud of the area beneath the road surface, which an operator can then manually edit and clean up on a computer to zero in on the targeted subsurface utility line.

Once the robot has the point cloud loaded, it goes to work on the pavement. Using a pneumatic quick tool changer at the end of its arm, it swaps the radar unit for a core drill to take an exploratory sample of the roadway. Once it confirms the depth and condition of the pavement, the RRES switches to a custom 35-hp electric chainsaw. All of the robot’s tools are powered by its onboard 35kW-hour lithium-ion phosphate batteries, with a converter to change DC power to three-phase AC. This is the same type of power that a robotic arm would typically have access to in a factory setting, explains Asmari.

rr使用链锯切割圆形keyhole in the roadway, using pressure sensors to assess when a plunge cut has gone deep enough. The RRES can cut a variety of shapes, including an elongated oval up to 36 in. in dia. The pavement “core“ is then lifted out of the hole using a pneumatic tool that can lift the core up to 3 meters (approx. 9.8 ft) above the robot’s base, provided it weighs less than 225 kg (approx. 496 lb). Connections for the pneumatic lifter’s air hose, the chainsaw’s water hose and the radar’s coaxial data cable are all handled autonomously during each tool change.

道路下方的土壤进行开挖是通过附着在真空软管上的超音速空气喷嘴完成的，该空软管破坏了土壤并将其从孔中抽出。机器人在盒子框架内执行此任务，以防止在工作区域外溢出。阿斯马里说：“每次（喷嘴）搅动它时，真空消除了土壤。”“最后我们有一个力传感器，因此，如果[RRES]与地下的资产接触，它将缩回并允许操作员去看。”除了更换工具推车并执行维护任务（例如收紧电锯的刀片）外，操作员还将在手头检查机器人的工作并确认其进度，然后再进入下一个任务。

For this first prototype, Asmari and his team focused on use cases for SGN’s gas network, and has equipped the RRES with the means to clean a standard gas pipe, clamp it, make a cut and then install a thermoplastic fitting. But it is not uncommon for there to be electrical cables or other sensitive utilities near gas lines, so the operation is designed to reduce the chance of accidental strikes, adds Asmari. “These [pipe-handling attachments] have pneumatic motors. We try to stay away from any electromagnetic field around tools,” he explains.

After work on the exposed pipe is complete, operators shovel the dirt back in the hole while the robot uses a compactor attachment to compact it layer by layer. Once finished, the RRES replaces the road pavement core as best as it can to restore the roadway to its previous condition.

“It pushes the core into the ground with a gentle downward force, wiggles the core around, finding the smoothest orientation to push back into spot,” says Asmari, noting this is only one of the specialized tasks his team had to custom-build for the RRES. “We’re designing things that have never been done before,” he adds.

According to ULC, the RRES’s battery pack charges in three to four hours, and offers eight hours of non-stop operation on a single charge. In terms of time spent on the site, ULC says the RRES can scan and identify an excavation site in 20 minutes, cut and remove a core in 45 minutes, and fully excavate a utility in about 20 minutes. Asmari says ideally the RRES could perform two to three successful operations in a single day. The robot has a working depth of about 6 ft, and the entire RRES platform is only 10 ft by 6 ft, small enough to work in a single road lane.

采取一种铰接式机器人arm off of a factory floor and putting it to work on the road took more than hardening it against the weather, explains Asmari.

“Putting the [RRES] in an unknown environment, giving it sensors, that was the biggest technical challenge,” he says. But the payoff is getting that factory-level of precision out in the field. “The robot has the same coordinate system for every tool it is using, it is aware of every point above and below ground,” says Asmari. “At all times an operator looking at the robot’s operation and can make sure it’s on mission. They can see the vitals, and can abort the mission at all times.”

The RRES is currently being tested on mock 30-ft-by-30-ft roadways meant to emulate the kind of roadbeds found in U.K. cities as well as U.S. cities such as New York. SGN made a $8.35-million initial investment in the development of the RRES, but the robot is not going to be used just for work on buried gas lines, says John Richardson, head of risk for SGN.

他指出：“我们已经在与伦敦的运输公司进行并行试验，并补充说，机器人的手臂可以使用各种用于不同应用程序的工具。“这不仅是用于天然气分销网络，而且是所有领域。我们现在也正在寻找协作合作伙伴来与[进一步]一起开发这一点。”