Automated Aircraft Structural Defect Detection Using Deep Learning and Computer Vision

Authors

  • Rexcharles Enyinna Donatus Department of Aerospace Engineering, Air Force Institute of Technology, Kaduna, Nigeria
  • Osichinaka Chiedu Ubadike Department of Aerospace Engineering, Air Force Institute of Technology, Kaduna, Nigeria
  • Mathias Usman Bonet Department of Aerospace Engineering, Air Force Institute of Technology, Kaduna, Nigeria
  • Samuel David Iyaghiba Department of Aerospace Engineering, Air Force Institute of Technology, Kaduna, Nigeria
  • Ifeyinwa Happiness Donatus Department of Computer Science, Kaduna State University, Kaduna, Nigeria
  • Ndubuise Isaac Mbada Metallurgical and Material Engineering Department, Air Force Institute of Technology, Kaduna, Nigeria

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15282/mekatronika.v7i2.11787

Keywords:

1Computer Vision, Deep Learning, Defect detection, Mask R-CNN, Instance Segmentation, Object Detection

Abstract

Manual aircraft inspections are labor-intensive and susceptible to human error, potentially compromising safety and accuracy. This study presents an automated defect detection framework based on the Mask R-CNN instance segmentation model for identifying cracks and dents in aircraft structures. A dataset of 2,000 annotated images was generated using augmentation techniques and used to train a ResNet-101-based Mask R-CNN model. The system achieved high detection performance, with crack detection reaching a precision of 92.8%, recall of 88.7%, and F1 score of 90.75%; dent detection achieved 91.2% precision, 88.1% recall, and an F1 score of 89.62%. Evaluation using mean Intersection over Union (IoU) and Average Precision (AP@[IoU=0.50:0.95]) confirmed accurate defect localization and segmentation. These findings demonstrate the model's potential to improve inspection reliability and operational efficiency, contributing to safer, more consistent aircraft maintenance practices.

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Published

2025-07-30

Issue

Section

Research Article

How to Cite

[1]
R. Enyinna Donatus, O. C. Ubadike, M. U. Bonet, S. D. Iyaghiba, . I. H. Donatus, and N. I. Mbada, “Automated Aircraft Structural Defect Detection Using Deep Learning and Computer Vision”, Mekatronika : J. Intell. Manuf. Mechatron., vol. 7, no. 2, pp. 108–123, Jul. 2025, doi: 10.15282/mekatronika.v7i2.11787.

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