Drones employed by Steinmueller in Africa significantly decrease maintenance and repair expenses.
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Hop on board with Steinmueller Africa's latest addition to its engineering services roster: the spiffy Elios 3 caged inspection drone, a game-changer in the realm of power station inspections. This bad boy offers a safer, more cost-effective approach, by minimizing the need for human inspections.
Carel van Aswegen, the Group QC/NDT Manager at Steinmueller Africa, spills the beans: "This drone is a lifesaver in potentially perilous and cramped spaces. It's a win-win situation, delivering precise data in hazardous areas while cutting downtime significantly."
With downtime slashed by up to half, this drone is all about efficient data collection and easy accessibility. Van Aswegen reinforces this, stating that inspections can be conducted when boilers cool down to a relatively warm 50°C, sans permits or confusing scaffolding installation. The drone also boasts a keen eye for details, pinpointing damage sites with uncanny accuracy.
The fine folks at Flyability designed the Elios 3 to do more than just heroically soar through the skies. It's the first indoor mapping and inspection drone capable of transforming raw asset data into valuable digital insights. Boasting a carbon fiber protective cage (measuring 18.9″ wide and 13.8″ tall), it offers 360-degree collision tolerance, perfect for tackling tight, complex mazes without a scratch. Its cutting-edge stabilization system ensures a smooth, stable flight even in chaotic conditions, crucial for capturing top-notch visual and thermal data.
This drone's impressive arsenal includes a 4K camera, flight control sensors, an inertial measurement unit (IMU), magnetometer, barometer, thermal imaging sensor, 3 computer vision cameras, time-of-flight (ToF) distance sensor, and LiDAR technology. Aldus, it delivers superior-quality imagery, enabling pinpoint-precise 3D mapping, even in underground locales. This allows the creation of accurate digital twins of inspected assets, offering an easier-than-ever report analysis on a 3D model.
But the Elios 3 isn't just about taking stunning photos - it's got brains too! Its advanced flight path detection enables it to navigate complex, GPS-denied environments autonomously with pinpoint precision. Real-time data transmission lets inspectors monitor live feeds and make well-informed decisions on the fly. To top it off, the Elios 3's modular payload options offer flexibility aplenty.
Van Aswegen explains how the drone has been put to good use in post-incident investigations. "One of our clients was hit by an on-site explosion. We swiftly deployed the drone to evaluate the damage, providing precise locations and live footage of the surroundings, enabling a quicker, more targeted response."
Beyond its current client perks, the Elios 3 opens up a world of opportunities for Steinmueller Africa. "This drone can work its magic almost anywhere it's unsafe, impractical, or economically unfavorable for humans to go", Van Aswegen adds. This includes coal storage tank facilities, grain silos, underground mines, manufacturing plants, warehouses, boilers, tunnels, cell phone towers, railway transport tankers, and bridges.
Steinmueller Africa first started employing Elios drones in 2017, putting South Africa on the map as the first country to acquire this technology from Swiss manufacturer Flyability.
- The Elios 3 drone, operated by Steinmueller Africa, brings advanced technology to the manufacturing industry, providing data-and-cloud-computing solutions for inspecting various facilities, including warehouses and boilers.
- With its sleek design and technological features, such as LiDAR technology and 4K cameras, the Elios 3 not only offers superior-quality imagery but also ensures safe transport of data through real-time transmission, revolutionizing data-collection processes in industries like transportation and logistics, such as railway transport tankers and bridges.
- Furthermore, the Elios 3 also showcases its capabilities in the realm of gadgets and technology, serving as an indoor mapping and inspection drone, capable of transforming raw asset data into valuable digital insights and creating accurate digital twins, reinforcing its role in the growing field of data-and-cloud-computing and digital twin technology.
