Intelligent Ship Hull Inspection and NDT Using ROV Based Flux Leakage Expert System

This paper describes the evolution of an especially designed sub sea Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) with dedicated electromagnetic flux leakage searching arm as a part of associated intelligent Non Destructive Testing arrangement, which is intended for inspecting the outer surface of large ship hull and floating production storage offloading (FPSO) platforms with complex shaped structures. Current research achievements apply the expert system techniques in the diagnostic system of sub sea exterior underwater hull and components base on the concept of Ampere's law and method of measuring circulating currents without any physical destruction by testing the suspected section of ship hull which is subjected to alternating current flow with selected frequencies.