To increase the efficiency of the loco's, the western railway has commissioned an Artificial Intelligence (AI) based Loco Inspection System at Trip Shed, Bandra Terminus.
This new system will go a long way in increasing efficiency as well as enhancing the repairs and maintenance works, thereby, improving loco outage in result punctuality of trains will be also improved further.
This will not only reduce in cost of maintenance but also help to cut download on maintenance of assets, said the official of WR, adding that unlike the existing system of carrying out maintenance in a periodic manner, a predictive asset maintenance system will continuously monitor the condition of equipment and generate the required alerts. It will help to take up immediate maintenance.
The new system has been put into service at Trip Shed, Bandra Terminus from 18th December 2021. The system is capable of carrying Inspection of the sides, underframe and roof.
It will be able to measure axle box temperatures, detect loose parts, hanging parts, wheel profile, foreign particles, carbon strip defects, broken roof insulators, brake block thickness, cattle guard defects, primary spring cracks, etc. and raise alarms for proper intervention.
This technology utilises hardware like 3D Camera, 2D Camera, LIDARs, Thermal Camera, Edge Processors, Access Points, Sliding Arms, etc.
"The speed of the system is 1m/min and the time taken to inspect one loco on these parameters is 20 mins as against 3 hours taken in manual mode. Due to these special features, this system has resulted in manpower savings, increase in pit availability and also brought about improvement in effective loco outage" said a senior officer of WR.
Confirming the development Chief public relations officer of WR Sumit Thakur said, "The first system of its kind of Indian railway, which will not only prove helpful to reduce the loco failure but also improve the overall efficiency of engines."
When asked about this system, an official said, "AI is the ability of a machine to display human-like capabilities such as reasoning, learning, planning and creativity, Which enables technical systems to perceive their environment, deal with what they perceive, solve problems and act to achieve a specific goal. The computer receives data - already prepared or gathered through its sensors such as a camera - processes it and responds."
