Notes from the shop floor.

Automated Antenna Inventory: Computer Vision Across 8,000 Towers

How we used purpose-trained YOLO models, iterative fine-tuning, and iPhone LIDAR to automate antenna detection and tower passport generation at scale.

Computer Vision ·Telecom ·LIDAR ·Machine Learning ·Inventory

Andriy · 6 min read

Inventor: Implementation Details

How we built Inventor's AI detection pipeline — from OCR on curved metal surfaces to multi-level frame analysis and zone models — for aviation-grade tube and fitting inspection.

Computer Vision ·OCR ·Manufacturing ·Quality Inspection ·Inventor

Andriy · 6 min read

Inventor in 2026: democratizing computer vision for the shop floor

How we combined mature technologies into a single mobile pipeline that compresses inspection setup from weeks to hours.

Computer Vision ·Manufacturing ·Quality Inspection

Kosta · 4 min read

Update on Roboscope in 2026: same AR defect registration, new anchoring approach

iPhone AR drifts by 1-2% over 20-30 metres — unacceptable on a 100 m blade. Here's the new anchor-on-known-features approach that brings Roboscope to 45 mm at 95% confidence, plus what it unlocks for repair.

Augmented Reality ·Manufacturing ·Quality Inspection

Kosta · 3 min read

Roboscope — designing an AR platform for industrial quality control

Five years on HoloLens, an overnight switch to iPhone, a client breakup, and a 1% drift at the tip of a 100 m blade — the story of how Roboscope took shape on the wind-blade shop floor.

Augmented Reality ·Manufacturing ·Quality Inspection

Andriy · 4 min read

Navigating the complexities of high-mix low-volume (HMLV) inspection

HMLV factories are stuck between machine vision that can't reconfigure fast enough and manual inspection that can't stay consistent. Here's where the gap is and what closes it.

Manufacturing ·Quality Inspection

Kosta · 5 min read

Quality where work happens

Bringing computer-vision inspection to the smartphone in the technician's hand — what AVIS detects, where it fits in the flow of work, and why mobile, software-first quality control aligns with HMLV economics.

Computer Vision ·Manufacturing ·Quality Inspection

Kosta · 7 min read

Agile quality control: inspection that keeps pace with production

How AVIS — Spiral's automated visual inspection cascade — adapts in hours instead of weeks, leveraging synthetic training data and real-world validation to make automated inspection practical for short-run, custom production.

Computer Vision ·Manufacturing ·Quality Inspection

Kosta · 4 min read

The roadmap for inspection: what comes next

As mobile and adaptable inspection systems become standard, the next step is intelligent, multimodal, and integrated solutions — turning quality control from a compliance burden into a driver of speed and competitive advantage.

Computer Vision ·Manufacturing ·Quality Inspection

Kosta · 5 min read

Navigation and minimap in mixed reality app

Why screen-era navigation patterns mostly break in MR, what to do with sound and modal dialogs, and the moment a building minimap turned into a full-size density map painted on a composite airplane part.

Mixed Reality ·UX & Interaction Design

Andriy · 5 min read

Marking in mixed reality

Three iterations of the Marker UX in Spector — from a free-floating object, to a robot-assistant spawn point, to ray-cast snap-to-surface — and what we learned about limiting degrees of freedom in MR.

Mixed Reality ·UX & Interaction Design

Andriy · 2 min read

Narrowing down the use case

A taxonomy of the many flavours of "reality", what makes MR irreplaceable on the shop floor, and how Spiral landed on non-destructive testing as the use case where the trade-offs actually pencil out.

Mixed Reality ·Non-Destructive Testing ·UX & Interaction Design

Andriy · 7 min read

Developing a UI in mixed reality: spot panel

Three iterations of the Spot Panel UI in Spector — from one panel per defect, to a single shared panel, to the open/closed states with a chunky connector that finally clicked with shop-floor operators.

Mixed Reality ·UX & Interaction Design

Andriy · 4 min read

We put data from the real world into AR

Tiny proof-of-concept that streams readings from an external device straight into the HoloLens 2 scene and pins them to the spot in space where the technician took the measurement.

Augmented Reality ·Non-Destructive Testing

Kosta · 1 min read

Digital grid for ultrasonic testing

How an AR-generated 1×1-inch grid replaces hours of manual chalk-and-mylar gridding on pipes, tanks, and pressure vessels — and the spatial-mapping building blocks that make it possible.

Augmented Reality ·Non-Destructive Testing

Kosta · 4 min read

NDT sensors for augmented reality

Which off-the-shelf ultrasonic flaw detectors and thickness gauges have the wireless connectivity needed to stream readings into an AR headset — a snapshot from Olympus, Sonatest, Sonobotics, and Waygate.

Augmented Reality ·Non-Destructive Testing

Kosta · 2 min read

Augmented reality is a game-changer for nondestructive testing

Manual gridding and wheel-encoder mapping make NDT slow and ambiguous. AR-generated grids and on-part heatmaps remove both bottlenecks.

Augmented Reality ·Non-Destructive Testing

Kosta · 3 min read

What is industrial AR and why should you still care in 2024?

A primer on industrial AR for innovation managers and investors: the five generic use cases on the shop floor, the AR / MR / VR / aR taxonomy, and the misconceptions to stop repeating.

Augmented Reality

Kosta · 6 min read

Can you digitize quality inspection paperwork in aircraft heavy maintenance in 2024?

10,000 job cards, 100+ people, a 40-day overhaul. Where AR-based inspection and repair confirmation could carve hours of paperwork out of aircraft heavy maintenance — and where regulation says paper still has to stay.

Augmented Reality ·Aviation & MRO ·Quality Inspection

Kosta · 5 min read

Spatial awareness is at the core of augmented reality

How spatial awareness in modern AR headsets changes the way factories index, create, and access technical information — and why location, not serial number, becomes the new key.

Augmented Reality

Kosta · 5 min read

Use case: visual measurement guide

Replacing the mylar stencil used to mark thickness-inspection spots on five-metre wing panels with a stable, in-tolerance Mixed Reality grid overlay.

Mixed Reality ·Manufacturing ·UX & Interaction Design

Andriy · 1 min read

Reactor platform to go deeper into aviation

After eight months on the CFM-56 we made Reactor scalable enough to add the V2500 in weeks, untangled the navigation, and brought the platform fully offline.

Mixed Reality ·Aviation & MRO

Andriy · 1 min read

Mixed reality for borescope inspection

Concept for an MR application that helps borescope inspectors locate suspected damage on jet engines and cut through hundreds of inspection pictures and videos to a decision faster.

Mixed Reality ·Aviation & MRO

Andriy · 1 min read

Reactor — mixed reality platform for aviation maintenance

Enabled with the object recognition it intertwines physical and digital worlds allowing the user to steer the virtual by changing the real.

Mixed Reality ·Aviation & MRO

Andriy · 3 min read