Citation

Oh J, Lee C. Sensors (Basel) 2017; 17(10): s17102244.

Affiliation

Department of Civil Engineering, Seoul National University of Science and Technology, Seoul 01811, Korea. changno@seoultech.ac.kr.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2017, MDPI: Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute)

DOI

10.3390/s17102244

PMID

28961204

Abstract

Power lines are cables that carry electrical power from a power plant to an electrical substation. They must be connected between the tower structures in such a way that ensures minimum tension and sufficient clearance from the ground. Power lines can stretch and sag with the changing weather, eventually exceeding the planned tolerances. The excessive sags can then cause serious accidents, while hindering the durability of the power lines. We used photogrammetric techniques with a low-cost drone to achieve efficient 3D mapping of power lines that are often difficult to approach. Unlike the conventional image-to-object space approach, we used the object-to-image space approach using cubic grid points. We processed four strips of aerial images to automatically extract the power line points in the object space. Experimental results showed that the approach could successfully extract the positions of the power line points for power line generation and sag measurement with the elevation accuracy of a few centimeters.

Language: en

Keywords

3D mapping; cubic grid points; drone; photogrammetry; power line