Automated Detection of Compressed-Air Leaks in Manufacturing Halls with robotic solutions

Compressed-air leaks cost money and energy. At Bosch Feuerbach, Bosch's largest site, with ~120 buildings and 800,000 m² of floor area, the supply network is largely tight – the losses occur on large, changing manufacturing floors and other technical areas. Accessibility and nonuniform machine layouts as well as the detection during operation times of the plant should be taken into account. Detecting leaks automatically saves energy and costs – and a working solution can be scaled to further Bosch plants. Today, leaks are found manually: staff walk the areas with handheld measuring tools occasionally, and these measurements do not cover all areas.

Build a modular detection tool – mounted on a suitable carrier platform such as robot dogs, drones or mobile robots – that finds compressed-air leaks on the production floors and technical installation areas at the Feuerbach site and integrates securely into Bosch's data systems. The core of the challenge is the integration: combining existing detection technologies (e.g. acoustic microphone arrays) with autonomous navigation into one working solution. Using existing off-the-shelf components is explicitly welcome.