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Robots slated to be cost-effective alternatives to traditional cleaning with the help of building maintenance units and abseilers

Serbot Providers, the service delivery and distributor arm of Swiss-based Serbot AG, a developer and manufacturer of custom and regular items for that maintenance of outer and/or inner facades, launched the Serbot Robot Climbing program which can be said to automatically clean windows, facades and solar panels at the Intercontinental Hotel, Festival City, Dubai on January 28, 2010.

The demonstration as to how the Gekko climbs on a façade was carried out by senior engineer Gabriel Strebel and robot operator Wolfgang Schmitz on the little facade specially erected for that objective.

The robot is really a cleaning solution for flat and disposed surfaces of high-rise buildings and combines all the requisite elements such as robot engineering, cleaning engineering, and fall arrester program and media supply in 1 total system. It could be utilized on the wide range of facades and does not need any devices for example guide rails. This robot can also be able to function at wind speeds that would prohibit manual cleaning, for security factors.

Dubai’s skyline will see substantial alterations when Gekko III and CleanAnt get to work on the the city’s high-rise buildings. The two are cleaning robots, specialised in cleaning windows and building facades utilizing the most recent technologies created in Switzerland by Serbot AG.

“We are bringing this new technology towards the UAE exactly where we’ve observed lots of potential, particularly using the skyscrapers and various architectural styles which are very hard to clean using conventional methods,” Bas Schmit Phiferons, Serbot’s Company Improvement Manager, said.

The main challenge in cleaning inaccessible facades would be to maintain not only the accessibility, but also the high quality of function. The use of robots to thoroughly clean glass, aluminium and mosaic facades is needed where conventional crane-gondola systems can’t work on one hand, and where these conventional techniques turn out to be financially unfeasible on the other hand.

Giving comparative figures, Schmit Phiferons mentioned that it was more cost-effective to clean locations like the solar panels of Masdar City and also the Burj Khalifa using the robots, citing a 75% cost savng benefit towards the owners on cleaning overheads, not to say the time saved.

Gekko, a disk-shaped robot, includes a cleaning capacity of as much as 400 square metres/hour, that is fifteen times faster than manual cleaning. It uses vacuum energy to attach itself towards the surface to become cleaned regardless of whether vertical, horizontal or slanted.

The robot then uses a windshield-wiper type of brush to blast away any type of dirt, be it dust, mud or even oils, a residue of fuel burning from cars and jets.

“No detergent is required for cleanup, that is an added environmental benefit. The robots can use dry ice, demineralised drinking water or drinking water with enzymes to eat aside the oils. They also can filter and recycle the used material to minimise waste,” Schmit Phiferons said.

However, other building shapes require a various method, and this really is exactly where CleanAnt is utilized. “Facade cleaning is hard, expensive and dangerous. The CleanAnt does this function safely and automatically; vertical or overhanging areas are not a issue for both robot techniques. CleanAnt also overcomes concave and convex areas and obstacles and can function in heavy visitors places,” said Bas Schmit Phiferons.

Even though cleanup of skyscrapers is the main field of application of CleanAnt, it can be utilized as inspection or repair tool for dams and bridges as well.