Railway Track & Structures - November 2008 - (Page 32)

Railroads automating m/w planning the current state of the track network for viewing and analysis of data in map, tabular and track chart views through the Web browser. “This latest product release included several important new features,” Stevens said. “The product now provides a means of accessing video images of the right-of-way. This powerful feature can be used for such applications as retrieval of all bridge locations on a subdivision with point and click access to images of those bridges. Additionally, the product now offers inspection history overlays in a track chart view. A simple query interface allows the user to dynamically render a track chart and rapidly view run on run result comparisons of the latest track geometry, rail flaw or Vehicle/Track Interaction automated inspections.” This summer ENSCSO released a new automated track inspection product, the RailScan™ Lite Hi Rail Gauge Inspection System. This non-contact laser gauge measurement system offers track inspectors a means to regularly monitor gauge conditions as a supplement to full track geometry inspections. Also, the product is being used to conduct gauge inspections on yard and industry track. The product installs on the bumper of the hi-rail vehicle and uses a simple USD connection to a laptop to where the end user can establish gauge thresholds and visibly monitor a strip chart. Audible and visual alarms indicate where gauge is out of tolerance. RailScan™ Lite includes location reference by both GPS and milepost/footage inputs. This fall ENSCO is planning a new software release for the management of Autonomous Vehicle/Track Interaction Monitoring data. This unattended system installs on rolling stock and is designed to continuously monitor in revenue service, car body and truck motions, as well as wheel/rail impacts for detection of unsafe track conditions that can damage vehicles or lading. The system uses the latest advancements in wireless communications to provide railway personnel with timely updates on the condition of track. Maintenance notifications are automatically routed to maintenance-ofway personnel via direct email notification based on geographic m/w track limits or by routing the information through a railroad’s internal maintenance management system. There are currently more than 200 systems 32 Railway Track & Structures Holland TrackSTAR® 479 with GRMS. operating in North America. “Often times, the rolling stock leaves the host railroad,” Stevens noted. “With the latest planned release of software, ENSCO will provide a centralized routing center that enables V/TI maintenance notifications to be directed to both the owner of the rolling stock and the owner of the track to maximize the value of this product in cases when the rolling stock leaves the host railroad. This new release will be offered as an additional service to ENSCO V/TI customers.” Holland Holland LP continues to expand its fleet of TrackSTAR® vehicles, which incorporate track geometry, rail profile and a Gauge Restraint Measurement System to measure track strength under load. The vehicles record rail and track measurements and provide information on urgent, priority or maintenance exceptions. Holland also processes the data through Industrial Metrics’ Rangecam software, which Holland acquired earlier this year to facilitate maintenance planning. Rangecam maintenance planning software programs are also used by Class 1, regional and rail transit systems to measure the rate of wear over time in order to plan rail and tie maintenance or changeout programs. The latest edition (Version 11) of the software shows track geometry, GRMS, rail wear, profile and rail flaw data on GPS-derived railroad route maps that can be overlaid on satellite, terrain and street-view maps. “This provides a visual overview of problematic areas on the system for upper management, while enabling frontline supervisors to drill down to the level of detail they need to plan maintenance at specific track locations,” said Rangecam Business Manager Bob Tuzik. A number of transit agencies and rail service providers utilize Rangecam to monitor rail wear and forecast replacement requirements. Measurement data that factors into rail trend analysis or rail replacement planning includes vertical and gauge-face wear and the overall percentage of head loss. Other wear parameters can also be queried to identify wear or geomtry exceptions. Efforts are currently under way, for example, to use rail cant measurements, which are captured by most of the “loaded” railbound and hi-rail geometry cars, to help identify the incidence of rail seat abrasion on concrete ties, where every 1/8-inch change in cant equates to one-degree of inward or outward rail cant. The Rangecam Enterprise system is scaled to work with Oracle or SQL Server-based databases that can manage track geometry, GRMS, rail wear and rail flaw data collected over thousands of miles of track and several years of testing. “Railroads are swimming in data,” Tuzik said. “They want to be able to locate defects, identify problem areas and plan maintenance accordingly. We designed Rangecam to do that.” Industrial Metrics also developed a Rangecam rail grinding module, which plots measured wear conditions against the desired rail shapes. The program determines the amount of metal to be removed and the grinding patterns and grinding speeds required to achieve the desired profile conditions. A similar program, Wheel Analyst, was developed with KLD Labs, Inc., to provide information about wheel conditions, wear rates and recommended re-truing cycles based on the measured wheel flange angle, height and thickness, tread wear, tread width, field lip and wheel gauge. Measured wheel profiles can be superimposed on “design” profiles to determine metalremoval rates for wheel truing programs. This program was used by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority to monitor wheel flange angles and wear conditions on its fleet of new and existing vehicles after a rash of derailments on the MBTA Green Line. The Rangecam Wheel Analyst software can also be used to examine how well existing or design wheel profiles match the existing or design rail profile conditions. Rangecam software has also been used to analyze curve performance and to monitor the effectiveness of maintenance procedures, as well as the effects of gauge-face lubrication and top-of-rail friction modifiers. The software also uses GRMS data to identify bad tie clusters www.rtands.com November 2008 http://www.rtands.com

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Railway Track and Structures Contents On Track Industry Today Supplier News AREMA News NRC News TTCI R&D TrainingVvital in Shaping Future of Railroad Industry Switch Stands, Switch Machines Automation Offers Improvements in M/W Planning AREMA 2008 Conference Report Products and Literature People Calendar Advertisers Index Sales Representatives Website Directory Professional Directory Classified Advertising Chicago Perspective

Railway Track & Structures - November 2008

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