Autonomous Mobile Asphalt Density Profiling Robot to Reduce Worker Risk

Project summary:

Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT) pavement construction personnel have lately improved quality assurance (QA) through utilization of new non-intrusive pavement profile sensors. Although proving to be accurate, the acquisition process can be manually intensive and hazardous. The primary objective of this workplan is to deliver to MnDOT two low-cost, modular, mobile robot platforms designed specifically for pavement density profile testing. Modularity will be ensured by integrating separate, distributed, "plug-and-play" modules that could be re-utilized for other mobile platforms, should the need arise for future implementations. Note that the aforementioned modularity will be based upon an open architecture that is compatible with further development. By implementing two robots, the transferability of the architecture will be evaluated. The mobile platforms will be assembled from widely available, low-cost commercial off-the-shelf components in order to minimize overall cost, recognizing that the landscape for such platforms is evolving rapidly.