To keep our ships safe at sea

Amazingly, defence industry personnel that inspect the ballast tanks of large warships will soon be assisted by robots.

Not walking, talking ‘Danger Will Robinson’ kind of robots but skittering six-legged hexapods under the command of automated scanning algorithms created at Flinders University.

Ballast tanks, fuel tanks or tanks containing potentially noxious organic material from the ocean are notoriously hazardous environments for humans to work in; with only one way in or out. All surfaces must be routinely checked during scheduled maintenance out of the water, and the spider robots have the ability to inspect every square millimetre, safely and efficiently.

When the project is complete, this has long term benefits and outcomes for both submarines and ships, helping to improve safety and reduce inspection times.

Evolving the spider robot technology to do the critical job of inspecting inside ships’ ballast tanks as well as humans, is a joint partnership between Flinders University, military defence shipbuilding organisation ASC, and the University of Wollongong.

Flinders University PhD student Rowan Pivetta is two years into a three and a half year project to evolve the spider robot technology to the stage where algorithmic intelligence can pilot the robot to accomplish tank inspections.

Making robots that can navigate all of the surfaces inside a ship’s ballast tank and inspect them thoroughly is a remarkably complex task

Flinders Associate Professor Karl Sammut, Rowan’s research supervisor, says the work has the potential to significantly improve safety on large ships worldwide. ‘Making robots that can navigate all of the surfaces inside a ship’s ballast tank and inspect them thoroughly is a remarkably complex task that could also eventually help to reduce inspection times and the exposure to hazards for maintenance staff.

The work Rowan is doing will eventually help to bring cost benefits to the maintenance programs by reducing time spent undergoing full-cycle docking.’

The hexapods project is just one of a myriad of new advances happening daily at any of the Flinders three campus precincts at Bedford Park, Tonsley and Victoria Square in the city.

Flinders is highly active in the ever-expanding defence capabilities and joint projects throughout South Australia.

But innovation and enterprise go way beyond defence to other vital areas such as urban commuting through their pioneering work in driverless electric vehicles, in areas of community health and medicine such as the earliest possible detection of bowel cancer, new programmes to assist in healthy ageing and the development of online palliative care and the research programmes go deeply into conservation and ecological protections...one team has even looked at how to evaluate the true benefits of art to our community and economy.

Today, as part of a far-sighted plan, much of our research and evolutionary work is done in partnership with private enterprise in the pursuit of university-lead outcomes with genuine commercial applications.

Indeed, Rowan’s work with the spider robots has been done in conjunction with the ARC Research Training Centre for Naval Design and Manufacturing partners as mentioned above.  As part of Rowan’s work he has a one-year placement with ASC as project sponsor.

‘To meet the requirements of my PhD and produce something that could be delivered for industry, I developed an algorithm that suited industry needs and worked out how it could be added to and enhanced.’

Together the network of engineering researchers across universities, industry and government have challenged and inspired to go into uncharted waters, and have the potential to significantly improve safety and inspection times on large ships worldwide, getting ships back at sea more quickly. 

At Flinders University, we believe working in close partnerships with industry and government is the way of the future for forward-thinking universities; it ensures our research is workable and solves real needs and our graduates are ready to make a difference in the workforce.