An underwater narrow gap welding seam tracking method and system based on visual sensing
By establishing a mapping between camera pixels and the welding coordinate system in underwater welding, and combining confidence grading and multi-medium refraction correction, stable feature extraction and high-precision tracking of underwater narrow-gap welding were achieved, solving the problem of visual feature extraction failure in underwater welding and improving welding quality and efficiency.
Patent Information
- Authority / Receiving Office
- CN · China
- Patent Type
- Applications(China)
- Current Assignee / Owner
- JIANGSU UNIV OF SCI & TECH
- Filing Date
- 2026-04-21
- Publication Date
- 2026-07-17
AI Technical Summary
Existing underwater narrow gap welding technology suffers from severe obstruction and the influence of numerous bubbles and scattered light generated by the underwater electric arc, resulting in failure to extract visual features. This leads to poor welding quality consistency, low efficiency, and insufficient safety. Furthermore, traditional mechanical follow-up structures cannot cope with underwater dynamic disturbances, easily resulting in defects such as undercut and incomplete penetration.
A mapping relationship between the camera pixel coordinate system and the welding coordinate system is established by using a high-speed camera to generate a reference trajectory. During the welding process, the relative position of the welding torch and the bevel is evaluated in real time through confidence level fault tolerance technology, and correction commands are generated to achieve stable tracking. Combined with multi-medium refraction correction and dual-threshold image segmentation, underwater arc saturation and scattering halo interference are suppressed.
It achieves stable extraction of narrow gap weld features in underwater environments with high turbidity, weld tracking accuracy within ±0.5mm, correction response time ≤100ms, and welding first-pass yield rate of over 90%, reducing defects such as undercut and incomplete penetration.
Smart Images
Figure CN122415677A_ABST