Automating the non-destructive testing of composite parts with an intelligent robotic platform

The industrial challenges of the FANTOM project

Dans l'industrie aéronautique, le contrôle non destructif est indispensable pour garantir l'intégrité des structures composites. Pourtant, les opérations In the aerospace industry, non-destructive testing is essential to ensure the integrity of composite structures. However, control operations still present several industrial challenges:

• Time-consuming and costly inspections.
• Significant human and material resources.
• Increasingly complex part geometries.
• The need to improve the flexibility of control operations.
• The need to integrate inspections directly into production lines.
• The challenge is to facilitate data analysis while maintaining quality and safety requirements.

Faced with these needs, the FANTOM project aims to make control operations more agile thanks to a robotic platform capable of adapting to industrial constraints.

Technologies developed for robotic non-destructive testing

The FANTOM project has made it possible to design a mobile platform integrating several complementary non-destructive testing technologies:

Integration of the platform into a digital continuity logic allowing a visualization of inspections in real time.

Automation of inspection paths thanks to a 3D geometric mapping of the part.

Optimized positioning of the ultrasonic probes based on the actual geometry of the parts.

Development of an ultrasonic end-effector with low water consumption to automatically inspect the central areas as well as the edges of the parts.

Development of visual inspection effectors capable of automatically detecting different surface defects using machine learning algorithms.

Centralization and combination of data from the various controls in the NDTkit software  to facilitate overall analysis.

Project results and industrial impacts

The FANTOM project demonstrated the feasibility of a robotic platform capable of automating non-destructive testing operations on composite parts.

The work carried out made it possible to:

• optimize the positioning of the probes thanks to the automatic adaptation of control paths;
• Develop ultrasonic testing capable of inspecting central areas such as the edges of parts.
• Automate visual inspection with artificial intelligence
• Combine several control methods to improve diagnostic reliability.
• Prepare for the integration of non-destructive testing into the production lines of the factory of the future.

The project's results pave the way for a new generation of robotic non-destructive testing systems capable of meeting the needs of current and future industrial processes.