The first time Jamie Beard, ’97 mechanical engineering, ’99 M.S., ’03 Ph.D, saw Steve Canfield, he was a Tennessee Tech University undergraduate presenting at an engineering awards dinner.
“I was one of a couple folks invited to give a presentation on a research project I completed for a special topics class,” Beard said. “Steve called me afterwards to invite me to present my project during one of his classes.”
In 1997, Canfield completed his graduate studies and took a faculty position in Tech’s College of Engineering. That same year, Beard began looking for an advisor for his master’s program.
Finding one didn’t take long. Mechanical engineering department chairman Ed Griggs called both men to his office due to their similar interest in machine design. At that meeting, Beard found his advisor. The pair studied mobile robotics for six years.
In 2007, they started a business.
“We had a great academic relationship when I was a student at Tech,” said Beard. “So I’m not surprised that we’ve managed this company well together.”
Tucked away just a few minutes northeast of Tech’s campus is three floors of office space for that collaboration, Robotic Technologies of Tennessee. Computer-aided design workstations and a 3-D printer are upstairs.
The bottom floor is a converted garage space that serves as a fabrication workshop filled with measurement and manufacturing tools. Most of the machine magic takes place there. Robots in various states of completion cover the space.
RTT designs and builds “track crawlers,” robotic machines with magnetic tracks that look like conveyor belts. They are designed to move across metal surfaces at any angle. With this, operators can drive manufacturing tools and inspection equipment to locations that previously required a greater degree of effort to reach.
Before, a worker may have had to climb up the side of a hundred-foot tank for measurement or repair. Now, Beard and Canfield’s magnetic robots can handle that task, decreasing the possibility of injury on the job.
With these crawlers, the company focuses on three main services: commercializing existing manufacturing tools like welding; conducting and supporting inspection services; and developing specialized crawlers for services; and developing specialized crawlers for government and industry clients.
One of RTT’s major inspection clients is the Tennessee Valley Authority. The TVA hired Canfield to develop an automated method of inspecting power lines before RTT started.
“Our first job resulted in a robot that was about 10 feet long and weighed half a ton,” Canfield said. “With our past experience combined, Jamie and I felt the proper direction was to make a small, 10-pound robot that could climb power lines.”
TVA officials were so impressed after a demonstration that they asked if the Tech student and professor could build a similar crawler to enter the boilers of power plants.
From then on, a relationship was born.
Beard and Canfield receive assistance from Steve Glovsky, a commercialization specialist who lives in Franklin, Tennessee. He has experience guiding companies that spin out from university initiatives.
Beard attributes the duo’s success over the years to their tenacity in the face of the adversity that comes from designing solutions to new types of engineering problems.
“We don’t give up easily,” said Beard. “I think that’s how we were able to form a group and stay together all these years. We all see eye-to-eye on a lot of things and don’t take no for an answer.”
Though RTT still inspects TVA properties, many of the company’s robotic designs end up welding in shipyards across the East Coast. Companies like General Dynamics NASSCO, Bath Iron Works and Huntington Ingalls Industries have purchased welding crawlers.
As the company grows, Canfield is a little more hands-off. He remains involved with proposals, technical developments and business direction, but the majority of work for clients is done by Beard and his team.
With such an important relationship already in place, it’s no coincidence that some members of this team are Tech graduates. Andrew Bryant, ’09 mechanical engineering, is the most recent hire at the company. He worked with Canfield as an undergraduate and joined the company when it formed his junior year.
Like others in the group, Bryant has a range of responsibilities. He spends time programming with computer-aided design, machining and fabricating metal parts and taking the crawlers into the field for inspections.
“Most of this stuff is new territory,” he said. “It hasn’t been done yet, and it’s really rewarding to have people come up to you at trade shows and say, ‘Wow, I didn’t know you can do stuff like this.’”
Bryant is working on his master’s thesis, which focuses on optimizing mobile robotic tracks over various surfaces.
“Working with people I studied under, I learned that my professors are people too,” said Bryant. “When you come to college, there’s this notion that professors know everything. I learned that what they know best is how to think about a problem.
“Collaborating outside of the classroom has allowed me to learn with my professors. That’s something few students get to experience.”