Structural analysis of automating measurements of floor gradients

Abstract

It is useful for one owning or buying a house to be able to assess its structure and identify the existence and severity of any damage. No previously existing method appears to make this assessment easily available. This thesis predicts that architecture will fail in some combination of eleven predictable ways that a simple robot can observe and distinguish by measuring the slope of select points on the floor. This prediction was tested on a case study house, and the model predicted 78.7% of the observed contour. A compact robot was fabricated and measurements of inclination were compared with those of a standard digital inclinometer. The ratio of the angle measured with the robot to that measured with the inclinometer was found to be 1.034 ± 0.193. This proof-of-concept study indicates that an inexpensive robot could be developed as a commercial product capable of assessing the structural safety of common houses.