Evaluation of Cleaning Performance of Square-Duct Cleaning Machine with Planetary Gear Mechanism: —Prototyping Cleaning Machine and Evaluation of Cleaning Rate by Grease Cleaning Experiment—

Abstract

This paper proposes a cleaning machine using a planetary gear mechanism to remove accumulated grease within kitchen ducts of diverse geometries, encompassing circular and square configurations. The contributions of this paper encompass describing the brush and motor determination methods, detailing the development of the actual machine, and presenting the outcome of the cleaning experiment. The purpose of this study is to remove accumulated grease within ducts via a single robot, thereby preventing duct conflagrations. While duct cleaning is typically done manually, small, hard-to-access ducts have often been uncleaned. In this study, we developed a cleaning machine using a planetary gear mechanism capable of scrubbing off accumulated grease within small square ducts through a singular brushing operation. In the cleaning experiment, the proposed machine successfully removed over 30% of the accumulated grease within a small, difficult-to-access duct. Therefore, we expect that the proposed machine will make a significant contribution to the prevention of duct fires by scrubbing off grease from ducts that are typically difficult for people to access and have not been cleaned in the past.