The world’s largest unmanned road construction fleet has completed maintenance works on a section of the busiest highway in China.
XCMG (Xuzhou Construction Machinery Group) has deployed its unmanned fleet to complete the spreading and maintenance of the Suzhou Road segment of the Nanjing-Shanghai Expressway.
The successful application of the fleet as an integrated set solution has been seen as milestone in developing intelligent highway maintenance and construction globally.
XCMG’s unmanned fleet consisted of 10 tandem road rollers and two large-width pavers, all under the unified command of the BeiDou satellite positioning reference station.
Supported by technologies including the highly precise BeiDou positioning, inertial navigation, and obstacle recognition, the fleet completed scheduled tasks such as driving, steering, and rolling compaction.
Commenting on the project, Li Xin, assistant general manager of Jiangsu Xiandai Road & Bridge Co. Ltd., said: “This unmanned road maintenance and construction project allowed us to reach the ‘intelligent maintenance’ stage.
“The inspection pass rate is much higher than that of traditional manual construction, and XCMG’s unmanned technologies have excelled in construction efficiency and control accuracy.”
XCMG applied its continuous asphalt thickness measurement radar technology to the unmanned road maintenance project, which it says is way ahead of the traditional core measurement that continuously and accurately measures the thickness of the paved asphalt without damage.
According to XCMG, the technology reached a maximum depth of 120mm and guaranteed a measurement error of no more than ±1mm.
Further, the unmanned fleet met all construction and maintenance requirements through the grid format tests of thickness, compaction, and friction coefficient.
Lige Xue, R&D engineer at XCMG, said: “In the future, XCMG will continue to commit to the R&D of intelligent and unmanned products, truly achieving standardization of unmanned engineering construction and reshaping highly complex and difficult construction.
“With intelligent sensing and control, digital construction and unmanned technology as the core, XCMG is dedicated to providing customized, high-quality intelligent solutions for customers.”
Image: XCMG’s Unmanned Road Construction Fleet, the Largest Scale Globally, Completes National Highway Maintenance Project
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