Thickness measurement of Inconel in a boiler at Tekniska Verken.

The Challenge

Boiler inspections in the power and energy sector are traditionally time-consuming, costly, and associated with significant safety risks. Accessing the walls and internal components typically requires scaffolding or rope access — work that can take several days of the outage before the actual inspection can even begin.

Measurements of the Inconel coating are normally carried out manually using an Elcometer, point by point. It is a slow process that requires personnel to enter a confined space and makes it difficult to obtain a complete and consistent overview of the boiler’s condition.

Every additional day spent on scaffolding and manual inspection also means additional plant downtime — often the most expensive part of an outage.

The Solution

Together with our Swedish customer, Tekniska Verken, we have developed an entirely new service that approaches the task in a different way.

By using a tether on our drone, we can maintain continuous power while flying inside the boiler. With the help of a custom 3D-printed fixture and an Elcometer — the same instrument normally used for manual Inconel measurements — the drone can carry out the measurements directly inside the boiler.

The Service Covers the Entire Boiler:

• Inconel measurements on coated surfaces — up to 150 measurements per hour, without scaffolding or rope access.

• UT thickness measurements in areas of the boiler where the steel tubes are not coated with Inconel.

• Thickness measurements of the superheaters, where the drone can fly directly in and perform the measurements.

The final product is the report. All data is collected in a 3D model where every measurement point can be viewed and presented as a heatmap covering all boiler walls.

The report provides a fast and visual overview of where wear is occurring and which areas should be monitored more frequently — creating a decision-making tool that is far easier to act on than long lists of individual measurements.

Results

• Time saved on scaffolding installation and removal per outage: 4–7 days

• Reduced plant downtime: 5–10 days

• Personnel entering confined spaces: 0

Collaboration and Development

The service has been developed in close collaboration with Tekniska Verken, who have been involved throughout the entire process — from the initial idea to the finished solution.

We would also like to thank our customer ARGO, who made facilities available for testing and contributed valuable feedback throughout the development of the prototype.

Next Steps

We are proud of this new service and look forward to rolling it out across Scandinavia over the coming year — ready for upcoming outages throughout the power generation sector.

“This case represents a major step towards making boiler inspection work better, faster, and more cost-efficient — but more importantly, it is a major step towards our goal of making this type of work 100% safe for people.”

– Victor Thomsen, CEO & Founder, Drone Eksperten