REVIEW AND ANALYSIS 41 ROOF CONDITION MONITORING 4.0 FRÉDÉRIC BOSCHÉ and JIAJUN LI IN THE 2024 edition of The IHBC Yearbook, the CyberBuild Lab at the University of Edinburgh contributed the article ‘Historic digital survey: conservation in the age of the fourth (digital) industrial revolution’. It presented a vision of how Industry 4.0 technologies could benefit the historic building conservation sector. In this new article, we report progress on the development of methods to fulfil that vision, in the specific but very common context of historic slated roof condition monitoring. The goal is to deliver Roof Condition Monitoring 4.0. CURRENT PRACTICE Roof inspection and maintenance, particularly for traditional slated roofs, remains highly manual and labour-intensive as consultants and contractors are required to access roofs in order to conduct slate-byslate inspection and repairs. The irregularity of traditional Scottish slates and their localised deterioration patterns make monitoring especially challenging. These activities often involve hazardous work at height, on uneven and slippery surfaces, while handling heavy materials. To reduce safety risks as well as costs associated with initial inspections (including potential scaffolding costs), remote inspection using drones (or ‘unmanned aerial vehicles’ as they are more correctly termed) is increasingly adopted for initial visual assessment. The captured imagery can be annotated to record visible defects, forming a visual archive that supports maintenance and repair planning. However, aside from the fact that the analysis of the pictures remains subjective, the defects (and plans of action) remain recorded as simple annotated images embedded in text reports. In this unstructured format the information is not easily retrievable and searchable, preventing the systematic monitoring of roof defects and general health over time. It is clear that current practice would benefit from (1) more systematic, objective remote inspection, as well as (2) structured and standardised documentation to ensure consistency, reliability and long-term asset monitoring and record keeping, in line with the emerging idea of digital building passports, known as Digital Building Logbooks.¹ INDUSTRY 4.0 FOR ROOF CONDITION MONITORING In collaboration with Historic Environment Scotland (and with support from the Stirling City Heritage Trust and the National Federation ¹ www.ec.europa.eu/newsroom/growth/items/690184/en Duff House: forecasting the extent of defects in roofing slates and tiles is rarely possible without either a scaffold or a drone-survey. (Photo: Historic Environment Scotland)
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