Technology
Drone Inspection & Remote Control Boats
Drone technology, cameras and data processing have come a long way over the last few years and are now a creditable alternative to the traditional ways of assessing structures or assets by inspectors, building surveyors or facilities management firms.
Drone technology, remote control boats etc can be used to gather digital data for conditional assessment of structures or for pre-acquisition surveys, due diligence surveys, planned maintenance programmes, dilapidation surveys or schedule of conditions of assets. The digital data provides deeper data insights, better collaboration on projects, improves data deliverables to clients while reducing costs and risks.
Drone Technology
Drone technology can be used for different types of inspections:
The digital outputs from drone technology can be as simple as geo-tagged HD images or video to more complex outputs like a 3D point cloud, 3D textured model, 2.5D digital surface model (DSM), 2D orthomosaic or 2D Google KMZ files. The digital data can also be used to create 2D CAD drawings or REVIT models.
Drone technology is a value adding tool for most structure/asset inspections as its safe, quick, economical and there is no business disruption. The digital data produced from drone technology can be used by the inspector or surveyor as part of their conditional assessment.
Some companies are starting to look at how they manage the digital outputs from inspections as a large amount of information can be captured for analysis. A cloud based platform can be used to store, manage, share and analyse the digital data. This type of system allows multiple users within a company to analyse the data, include annotations and then produce a PDF and/or excel report based on all the defects/issues that were identified. This information can be shared with contractors for pricing repairs or maintenance.
Benefits
Managing inspection data digitally has many benefits:
Improves team collaboration and workflow on projects
A digital record of an inspection in time
Gives the ability to compare inspection data over multiple time periods
Data can be digitally shared with contractors for pricing of works
Communicate with the client on works to be carried out
