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Innovative Robotics in Hotels: An article by Douglas Rice

A Douglas Rice article highlights the impact of #robotics in the hotel industry. “In addition to the financial benefits, robots transform window maintenance from a dangerous task to a low-risk one. This allows hotels to clean their windows much more frequently and save money at the same time.”

Read the full article here.

Our technology is especially beneficial for hotels: windows are spotlessly clean every day, resulting in a significant improvement in quality for hotel guests. In addition, the use of our robots offers maximum privacy, as guests cannot be seen through the windows.

Hieronder het gedeelte uit artikel dat over glazenwasrobots gaat:

Window and Façade Cleaning Robots

A relatively new category is robots that can clean the exterior windows and facades of tall buildings. For most of history, such tasks have been handled by workers dangling from ropes or standing in large gondolas (called Building Maintenance Units or BMUs).

Kite Robotics, which is fully deployed in Europe and is in the early stages of launching into the U.S. and Middle East, has the only product I am aware of that uses robots to replace the dangerous and time-consuming aspects of exterior cleaning. As before, a video is the best way to get a sense of how it works.

The units require much less roof space than BMUs, typically with three pivoting fixtures on each side that hold control cables and power/water feed lines. The units are attached by four cables on opposite sides at the top and bottom; they are computer-controlled to climb the building while a rolling brush cleans the windows and other façade elements. Custom modifications enable the unit to deal with most vertical and horizontal elements of a façade that might prevent a straight run.

A two-person crew manages each cleaning cycle by attaching the cables at the top and bottom and to the robot on the ground. After one side of the building has been cleaned, they disconnect it and move it to the next side. The typical robot unit weighs around 50 pounds (24 kilograms), although this can vary with customizations.

The system replaces, and is priced similarly to, BMUs, which are typically well into six figures USD or Euro. Because they work much faster than manual window washers on ropes or in gondolas, however, the company estimates labor savings of at least 80%, and similar savings for water and energy. Tap water is purified as part of the system prior to use, which prevents spotting from dried mineral buildup on windows.

Because of the cost, Kite Robotics suggests that their solution is suitable only for buildings taller than about 80 feet (25 meters). The robots and cabling can be customized to deal with many but not all façade designs. In addition to financial benefits, the robots change window-cleaning from a dangerous job to one with minimal risks, enabling hotels to do window cleaning on a much more frequent basis while still spending less.

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