Robot-based construction automation: An application to steel beam assembly (Part I)

Abstract

The construction industry has not traditionally been a favorable field for the application of robotic technologies. However, various motivations such as the shrinking labor population, the aging of skilled workers, and the safety issue of ironworkers have promoted the development of robotic construction systems. In this research, one of those trials, a project entitled "Robot-based construction automation system for high-rise building" is presented. Among diverse construction works, this project focused on a robotic automation of the steel beam assembly. The project is a cooperative effort between a robot research group and a construction automation group in South Korea. The main objective of this paper is to an introduction for the development of a robotic beam assembly system administered by the robot research group. The robotic beam assembly system consists of a robotic bolting device that performs the main function for the beam assembly work and a robotic transport mechanism that transports the robotic bolting device to target bolting positions around a building under construction. This paper presents the specific functions, structures, and mechanisms of the robotic bolting device and accounts for the application of the visual servo control technique to a bolting control system which is a software component. The robotic transport mechanism part is discussed in a companion paper [14]. The real prototype of the proposed system was manufactured and intensive field tests were conducted in a test bed. Moreover, this system was applied to a section of a real building, the Robot Convergence Building of Korea University, South Korea, which has one story below and seven above the ground, and obtained a feasibility of an application of the robotic beam assembly system to actual construction sites. The suggested system is expected to be a promising alternative to ironworkers in the steel beam assembly in terms of safety and time-efficiency. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.