Applying a Combination of the YOLOv8 Model and 3D Point Cloud Images in Asphalt Pavement Maintenance

Asphalt pavement distress detection plays a pivotal role in highway maintenance, providing an essential basis for optimizing maintenance strategies and allocating funding. Consequently, quick detection and efficient identification of distress are crucial for enhancing the quality of highway maintenance. This study aims to acquire high-precision distress data using 3D laser point cloud technology, identify distress types via the YOLO algorithm, and extract geometric features such as length and angle. Specifically, a recognition method based on 3D laser point cloud images is proposed, where point cloud data are converted into planar images for processing. Experimental results indicate that the laser point cloud detection achieves millimeter-level precision, the distress recall rate exceeds 85%, and the identification precision reaches 79.5%, demonstrating satisfactory detection accuracy and efficiency.