TwinGen: Advanced technologies to automatically generate digital twins for operation and maintenance of existing bridges

CRC Press eBooks, pp. 213–220

Abstract

The high effort of operating and maintaining existing infrastructure facilities resulted in a large stock of structurally deficient bridges in most industrialized countries. Today, the condition assessment of bridges is conducted mostly manually. To relieve effort and costs, the digitization and automation of conventional manual, labour-intensive methods is necessary. We interpret the ambiguously used term ”digital twin” (DT) in this study as a semantic-geometric model of an existing asset (here, a bridge) that contains all information required for assessing its current condition. This paper proposes an approach to automatically generate the DT of existing bridges from point cloud data (PCD) and images captured from the structure. The PCD of the bridge is semantically segmented by means of ML techniques, and a digital model is created using parametric modeling. Subsequently, detected damages and data from existing bridge maintenance systems are linked to the model to create a full DT. This paper reports the main results of the TwinGen research project: The digital twinning process of bridges can be automated to a large extent, in order to efficiently support the maintenance process of bridges.

Authors 12

1. Simon Vilgertshofer

   Technical University of Munich

   Affiliation as printed

   Chair of Computational Modeling and Simulation Technical University of Munich , Germany

   Chair of Computational Modeling and Simulation Technical University of Munich, Germany

2. M. Saeed Mafipour
3. A. Borrmann

   Technical University of Munich

   Affiliation as printed

   Chair of Computational Modeling and Simulation Technical University of Munich , Germany

   Chair of Computational Modeling and Simulation Technical University of Munich, Germany

4. J. Martens Aachen Geodetic Institute Chair for Computing in Civil Engineering & Geo Information Systems

   RWTH Aachen University

   Affiliation as printed

   Geodetic Institute and Chair for Computing in Civil Engineering & Geo Information Systems RWTH Aachen University , Germany

   Geodetic Institute and Chair for Computing in Civil Engineering & Geo Information Systems RWTH Aachen University, Germany

5. T. Blut Aachen Geodetic Institute Chair for Computing in Civil Engineering & Geo Information Systems

   RWTH Aachen University

   Affiliation as printed

   Geodetic Institute and Chair for Computing in Civil Engineering & Geo Information Systems RWTH Aachen University , Germany

   Geodetic Institute and Chair for Computing in Civil Engineering & Geo Information Systems RWTH Aachen University, Germany

6. R Becker Aachen Geodetic Institute Chair for Computing in Civil Engineering & Geo Information Systems

   RWTH Aachen University

   Affiliation as printed

   Geodetic Institute and Chair for Computing in Civil Engineering & Geo Information Systems RWTH Aachen University , Germany

   Geodetic Institute and Chair for Computing in Civil Engineering & Geo Information Systems RWTH Aachen University, Germany

7. Jörg Blankenbach Aachen Geodetic Institute Chair for Computing in Civil Engineering & Geo Information Systems

   RWTH Aachen University

   Affiliation as printed

   Geodetic Institute and Chair for Computing in Civil Engineering & Geo Information Systems RWTH Aachen University , Germany

   Geodetic Institute and Chair for Computing in Civil Engineering & Geo Information Systems RWTH Aachen University, Germany

8. Anne Göbels Aachen Chair of Design Computation

   RWTH Aachen University

   Affiliation as printed

   Chair of Design Computation RWTH Aachen University , Germany

   Chair of Design Computation RWTH Aachen University, Germany

9. J. Beetz Aachen Chair of Design Computation

   RWTH Aachen University

   Affiliation as printed

   Chair of Design Computation RWTH Aachen University , Germany

   Chair of Design Computation RWTH Aachen University, Germany

10. Firdes Çelik

    Ruhr University Bochum

    Affiliation as printed

    Chair of Computing in Engineering Ruhr University Bochum , Germany

    Chair of Computing in Engineering Ruhr University Bochum, Germany

11. Benedikt Faltin

    Ruhr University Bochum

    Affiliation as printed

    Chair of Computing in Engineering Ruhr University Bochum , Germany

    Chair of Computing in Engineering Ruhr University Bochum, Germany

12. Markus König

    Ruhr University Bochum

    Affiliation as printed

    Chair of Computing in Engineering Ruhr University Bochum , Germany

    Chair of Computing in Engineering Ruhr University Bochum, Germany