CordView: A cord-like vehicle system for search and inspection of environmental workspace — A prototype

We have been designing and developing a small-diameter cord-like vehicle system for search and inspection tasks in confined deep workspace. An elemental technology Active Joint Mechanism useful to the downsizing and diameter reduction is introduced and hybrid active-/passive-segmentalization is proposed, to provide alternative autonomous/supplementary mobility capability, internal-sensor-based real-time localization ability, and variable-length system composition, and thus to respond to a wide range of search requirements. The complete kinematic analysis of the system is provided. A prototype system and experimental results are presented to demonstrate the system structure, multimodal search sensing and aggregating, and a multi-protocol sensor info-communication/motion control interface.