Regular surface-maintenances are necessary for high structures to increase service life. The traditional manual operation has shortcomings like limited maneuverability, poor operating quality, low operating efficiency, and high risk of physical harm, which makes it urgent to develop wall-climbing robot for carrying out surface-maintenances of high structures with high efficiency, low cost, and good protection of operators. In this article, we have developed a wheeled wall-climbing robot that uses a permanent magnet adhesion system to climb on large steel surfaces. Wheel traction to avoid slippage is increased by using inflated rubber tire while maintaining a desired air gap for the magnet system. Research is directed at designing a lightweight magnet system to provide an optimum adhesion force and at determining required tire pressures to maintain a specified air gap between the magnets and the surface.
Design of permanent magnetic wheel-type adhesion-locomotion system for water-jetting wall-climbing robot