Simple fault detection system of railway tracks independent of GPS for medium-sized railway companies

2015 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 26630210
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Structural engineering/Earthquake engineering/Maintenance management engineering
• Research Institution: The University of Tokyo
• Principal Investigator: Su Di 東京大学, 工学(系)研究科(研究院), 講師 (40535796)
• Project Period (FY): 2014-04-01 – 2016-03-31
• Keywords: 携帯情報端末 / 中小鉄道 / 軌道異常検知

Outline of Final Research Achievements

In this study, a simple fault detection system of railway track independent of GPS is developed, which works for early detection of the track abnormality from vibration responses of the commercial trains by using smart phones progressed rapidly in recent years. It is aimed to propose an inexpensive portable constantly monitoring system in track management for 120 medium-sized railway companies in Japan.
First, a method of train localization through the mutual correction of acceleration and interior sound is proposed and implemented with smart phones. Then, by improving the train-track interaction analysis techniques the vibration response is obtained to identify the cause of the specific irregularity in a particular track structure. In addition, the observability analysis helps to propose a practical onboard measurement scheme including the required measured parameters and sensor arrangement. Only the smart phones can realize a simple onboard fault detection system of train tracks.

Free Research Field

土木工学