Introduction
While there are always risks in anything related to construction or infrastructure maintenance, the introduction of drones and unmanned aerial vehicles have done so much to reduce the risks.
Our improved drone capabilities and camera quality have made them more versatile for a wider range of applications, including inspecting roofs, solar panels and solar farms, bridges and other structures, telecommunication towers, construction sites, terrain mapping, agricultural monitoring, real estate, and more.
Traditional Inspections
In the past, roof inspections were a time-consuming and risky process. Inspectors would need to use ladders, scaffolding, or other elevated work platforms to access the roof, which could be dangerous. In some cases, traffic management plans would also be necessary. Drone Survey London eliminates these risks by using drones to inspect roofs. Drones can fly over roofs without the need for any physical access, which is much safer and more efficient. Drones can also be equipped with thermal imaging cameras, which can provide inspectors with a more comprehensive view of the roof.
Why use drones for building inspections?
If you’re a homeowner, pulling the ladder out of the garage may seem like the easiest way to go about inspecting the roof of your home – but, it isn’t. It’s dangerous! Not to mention a human on a roof just can’t safely inspect all aspects of the roof especially on high peaks. Drones are absolutely the best for performing building inspections. Modern technology now allows for a faster, easier and more efficient way to inspect all the areas of a roof that are just plain dangerous to inspect by physically putting a person at risk. Not to mention a drone will capture still images and videos of normal vision or thermographic spectre with ease.
Using thermal imaging for building applications
Thermal imaging cameras are a powerful tool for inspecting buildings. They can identify problems with insulation and heat loss, air leaks, structural damages, some electrical systems’ faults, as well as areas with moisture or damp build up, that are not visible to the naked eye.
Thermal imaging technology has become one of the most valuable diagnostic tools for building inspections, and it can identify problems early, allowing them to be documented and corrected before becoming more serious and more costly to repair.
A building diagnostics inspection with a thermal imaging camera can help:
- Visualise potential energy loss areas
- Detect missing or defective insulation
- Source air leaks
- Find moisture in insulation, in roofs and walls, both in the internal and the external structure
- Detect mould and badly insulated areas
- Locate thermal bridges
- Locate water infiltration in flat roofs
- Detect breaches in hot-water pipes
- Detect construction failures
- Monitor the drying of buildings
- Find faults in supply lines and district heating
- Detect electrical faults
Thermal imaging cameras are the perfect tool for locating and identifying building failures because they make the invisible visible. On a thermal image problems seem to jump right out at you. A thermal imaging camera is the one tool that really lets you see it all.
A thermal image that includes accurate temperature data provides building experts with important information about the insulation conditions, moisture ingress, mold development, electrical faults, the presence of thermal bridges and the conditions of HVAC systems.
Thermal imaging cameras are such a valuable and versatile tool that it is not possible to list all the applications. New and innovative ways of using the technology are being developed every day. Some of the many ways in which thermal imaging cameras can be used within the range of building related applications are explained in this section of the guide.
By using drones we reduce safety risks
The fact that drones enable an individual to perform a roof inspection while remaining safely on the ground may be the single greatest advantage of their use. As per the HSE, around than 14 people die each year in the United Kingdom falling from ladders, and falls from ladders account for almost a third of all injuries 150k ladder-related injuries are treated in the ER (emergency room). The use of drones eliminates this risk entirely.
By using drones we reduce the inspection time
Industry studies show utilising drones for inspecting a roof can cut the inspection time down, on average, from three hours to one. For a roofing estimator or an insurance adjuster, this can prove invaluable allowing them to inspect far more properties in a single day, with a higher degree of accuracy.
It goes without saying that there are some buildings and homes with roofs that are either inaccessible or simply too daunting to just pull out the ladder. A drone roof inspection performed by a skilled pilot can yield images a person would never be able to obtain. Can you really picture yourself atop that fourth-story gable with a tape measure and a camera, holding onto a ladder or dangling under an overhang?
Benefits to roofs
Drone Survey London’s roof thermal inspections with drones creates numerous benefits, particularly in identifying invisible or less visible defects while reducing hazardous activity. The thermography and camera technology that can be attached to drones assist with finding roofing faults that are difficult to spot from ladders or are invisible to the naked eye. By studying heat signature reports, problems like failing insulation, air gaps, wet insulation, water ingress, and AC piping and cooling tower problems can be found even if there are no visible sign of them. Drone Survey London are also able to take high resolution photography that can overlay the thermal map, making it easier to report to clients on the issues found. Additionally, the drone cameras can zoom in on small problems that will develop into larger ones if not repaired.
Infrared thermography is the transformation of an infrared image into a radiometric one, which allows temperature values to be read from the image. So every pixel in the radiometric image is in fact a temperature measurement. In order to do this, complex algorithms are incorporated into the thermal imaging camera.
By using drones for roof inspections, the risk has been significantly reduced. In addition to this, since there is no longer a need for ladders, scaffolding or cranes, using drones is an instant cost-saving measure.
Drone Survey London provides Thermal (IR) roof inspections for commercial and residential buildings throughout the country. These IR shots combined with RGB shots can be a great insight into potential roof issues ranging from poor insulation to moisture retention.
Drones changed the way we inspect assets
Drones have revolutionized the way we inspect difficult-to-reach places. In the past, inspecting a tall building or high-voltage power line would require a team of workers and expensive equipment. This was not only dangerous, but it was also expensive. With drones, we can now inspect these areas safely and efficiently. Drones can fly to places that are inaccessible to humans, and they can capture high-quality images and videos that can be used to identify potential problems. This has led to a significant reduction in the risk of injury to human workers, and it has also saved businesses a lot of money.
Unmanned aircrafts eliminate the ladders entirely from inspections. Drones can now provide a safe and effective method to gather high definition images and video of roofs and other areas where issues can occur and defects are difficult to be seen.
Drone Survey London’s aerial inspections are designed to increase safety, improve efficiency, reduce time and labor costs. You will also achieve a much better view of any potential repair job than you would from a single trip by a person with a camera. Modern HD video and image technology allow you to pinpoint specific areas with far greater accuracy than ever before.
Benefits to solar panels and solar farms
Drones are also incredibly beneficial for inspecting solar panels, solar farms, and other electrical equipment. A drone can fly over a large area in a short amount of time, capturing high-resolution images and videos that can be used to identify potential problems. This is especially important for thermal inspections, as heat tends to build up in areas of high resistance in electrical systems. A manual inspection would not be able to detect these problems as quickly or easily as a drone-based thermal inspection.
Early detection of problems is essential to prevent them from becoming more serious. Electrical system failures can cause fires, electrocutions, and damage to infrastructure. By using drones to inspect electrical equipment, we can help preventing these problems and keeping people safe.
Telecommunication towers inspection
Telecommunication towers need to regularly be checked to evaluate antennas positioning, faults or broken equipment and other aspects. However, telecom towers can be 1200 feet high. To visually inspect them requires a qualified specialist to climb to the top of the structure, take photos and/or make visual observations which are compiled in a report outlining the state of the equipment in the tower.
The problem with this method is that it is very dangerous for the person climbing the tower, who risks serious injury if they fall. It is also time consuming, expensive and can produce low-quality or incomplete data due to limited clearance and room for movement up there.
The drone tower inspection methodology we use is to capture top-down and horizontal viewpoints. These perspectives are only obtainable from the air, and we use 40 to 50-megapixel cameras to ensure maximum detail and resolution are achieved. The data is then combined with extremely powerful giga-pixel camera technology, taking hundreds of consecutive images which we then seamlessly stitch together to produce ultra-high-resolution images of the entire communication tower from top to bottom.
The services from Drone Survey London can also deploy thermal imaging cameras to identify high-resistance joints and potential failure points as part of our communication and cell tower inspections.
Mobile communications infrastructure is a vital part of national communications grid and at the same time a very competitive business. If cell equipment is down or not working correctly, then it costs all stakeholders. Drones in the right hands, offer the ability to undertake a detailed inspection of all the equipment and from a review of the images from that inspection determine if you need to put people on the tower to remedy the issue.
One or two man teams, with equipment and transport to access the asset, make contact with the customer as needed, complete a comprehensive image collection of the tower/pole and surroundings for context based on a predefined shoot list. Climbing is not required, most cases you don’t even need to be close to the asset. Time on site is greatly reduced, impact on site is greatly reduced and risk factor is reduced by an order of magnitude. (This makes insurance companies very happy).
Drones are also ideal for bridge inspection
When it comes to bridge inspections, drones are the option of choice to reduce costs, speed review, provide better data and improve worker safety, as they are across many other sectors.
Compared to rappelling, or a many-ton piece of machinery, a small light drone is safer and more efficient.
The lane closures often needed for conventional bridge inspections can lead to traffic detours and traffic queues. Drones are a less expensive way to get similar results to traditional bridge inspections without tampering with the highway traffic.
The same inspection using a drone would require only two workers — a pilot and a spotter — and can be completed in a few hours at a fraction of the cost while allowing workers to maintain a greater standoff distance and still gather the data needed to perform inspections.
CAA CERTIFIED PILOT
CAA approved & certified for UAV category 0-25kg daytime and night-time flights
CAA Operational Authorisation Cert No.: 14004
CAA GVC (General Line of Sight)
CAA A2 CofC (A2 Category Certificate of Competence)
