ROBOTIC TECHNOLOGIES OF TENNESSEE — Department of Defense SBIR Phase I: N162-104

Description

The basis of this proposal is to introduce robotic and automation techniques to better remediate foreign object debris (FOD) form hangers, taxiways and engine bays. This increases the effectiveness of existing FOD technologies by (1) eliminating or minimizing problems with the manual manipulation of these technologies and (2) enhancing FOD removal systems by adding multiple remediation technologies (i.e., more than one FOD technology). In both cases, RTT will use when possible, off the shelf and commercially available technologies modified for specific FOD applications. Current FOD remediation techniques are generally good at removing most FOD, as much as 95% or more. However, if the FOD technology cannot reach or simply misses the FOD, the FOD remains. RTT has brought automation and automatic control to a number of industrial environments to increase a variety of performance characteristics including productivity, quality and consistency. The focus is on the operational side of demonstrating that roboticized FOD systems can work in the field. Research is focused in motion control, navigation, operational control and monitoring. The net result is to address the hard to get FOD that creates billions of dollars of damages annually in the airline industry.