Power Station Boiler Pipewall Inspection
Project - Energy Infrastructure
Client | Confidential
Scope | Drone Inspection
Equipment | Elios 3 RPAS
Sector | Energy
Location | South Australia
Azure successfully tackled a complex close visual internal inspection of multiple boiler pipe walls at a gas-fired power station using our Flyability Elios 3 drone.
The working area was exceptionally tight to access, and using a remote inspection methodology completely removed the need to scaffold the pipewall area for access. This provided a significant cost saving, eliminated the risk of impact damage to the interharp equipment, and reduced the duration of the shutdown in this area.
The Elios 3 captured visual and LiDAR information simultaneously, which facilitated an intuitive review of location-referenced points of interest on a 3D laser scan of the structure in the Inspector 5 software. A highly valuable capability when every point of interest looks almost exactly the same!
Visual inspections in confined spaces are known to be risky, long, and expensive — but they don’t have to be!
Benefits of internal drones for Power Station Boiler Inspections
Speed
Using the Elios 3 RPAS for the inspection enabled inspectors to complete the work in 2 day instead of 12 days, significantly improving the turnaround of the inspection process.
Safety
The Elios 3 RPAS eliminated the need for working at heights and reduced the quantity of personnel working in the confined space of the boiler. This reduced the risk associated with the inspection, and kept the team safe while gathering key data.
Savings
Azure provided significant savings by eliminating the need to build multiple 20m high scaffolds inside of the boilers by deploying our Elios 3 RPAS, mitigating the risk of damaging the plant equipment with working platforms, and reducing the duration of the shutdown so that plant could start generating power sooner than traditional methods.
Data Quality
Azure’s remote pilot inspection team provided high resolution 4k video and full 3D model of the pipework and supporting structures to their client, including localised points of interest. This streamlined the engineering assessment and pinpointed the position of any defects that needed additional review.
