Publications / 1993 Proceedings of the 10th ISARC, Houston, USA

An Evaluation of the Pipe Manipulator Performance in a Material Handling Yard

T.Y. Hsieh, C. Fulton, G.E. Gibson, C.T. Haas,
Pages 293-300 (1993 Proceedings of the 10th ISARC, Houston, USA, ISBN 9780444815231, ISSN 2413-5844)
Abstract:

The purpose of this paper is to compare the productivity between a prototype pipe manipulator and a telescopic rough-terrain crane in handling pipes in a piping material laydown yard. Productivity data where collected by video-taping identical operations done by two machines in the field. The productivity data are evaluated in terms of total cycle time and total work-hours. The results show that the pipe manipulator has a slightly shorter cycle time but is out performed by cherry picker by ratio of 5.16:1 in terms of total work hours, primarily by grippers restriction on lifting one pipe per lift. A discussion of possible ways to improve the manipulators productivity in handling pipes reveals two major directions for enhancements: (1) enabling multi-pipe lift and (2) designing a better control system. These enhancements not only augment the manipulator’s productivity to be comparative to that of cherry picker but also reduce the cycle time by 67%

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