Railway track condition monitoring
09/06/2023
Railway track condition monitoring Asia Mobility Technologies Sdn Bhd, a leading mobility-as-a-service (MaaS) and Internet of Things (IoT) solutions provider, has successfully completed a live test-bed programme for railway condition monitoring with KTM Bhd (KTMB), Malaysia’s largest railway operator.
Known as IOrail, the system involves the use of drive-by sensing technologies with custom-designed IoT devices installed on board trains. The data collected by these devices is fed into Asia Mobiliti’s cloud platform, which is powered by machine learning algorithms, processes vibration signals and performs defect prediction in real time. This allows railway operators to monitor physical railway tracks via a virtual model and provide real-time condition parameters and defect detection capabilities to uncover faults and address them before accidents occur. The live test-bed is thought to be the first of its kind in Malaysia and the complete solution was developed in-house by Asia Mobiliti.
Stressing the value of IOrail, which enables the creation of a railway track digital twin, thus enabling rail operators to move away from preventative and towards predictive maintenance, Ramachandran Muniandy, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Asia Mobiliti, said: “Such solutions are typically associated with large and costly systems from multinational vendors that run into millions of ringgit, but we have shown that Asia Mobiliti has the expertise and capabilities to do so in a cost-effective manner with 70% cost savings.”
According to an industry survey conducted by Asia Mobiliti and ASAP Mobility, a Malaysian-based system engineering and consultancy firm, half of railway operators in Asia are without condition monitoring systems and, of those that do have them, 54% carry out monitoring using manual inspection methods. Furthermore, four in five operators indicated a willingness to upgrade to better digital systems, while almost two-thirds want higher detection accuracy and faster reporting turnaround times.
The survey respondents comprised railway operators and rail asset owners in Hong Kong, Malaysia, Indonesia, India, the Philippines and Saudi Arabia.
Asia Mobiliti claims that IOrail’s proactive monitoring capability is a boon for railway operators, as current railway condition monitoring systems require infrastructure to be installed along the railway tracks or wayside.
With IOrail’s deployment only requiring installation on rolling stocks and using open 4G connectivity, operators are relieved of heavy capital expenditure. This makes it far more cost-effective and scalable for railway operators across the developing world, where railway networks are critical for the movement of passengers and goods.
The test-bed programme saw IOrail deployed on KTMB trains traversing the Skypark Link and selected Komuter routes. Over 400 GB of data was collected, spanning more than 135,000 km of track distance travelled over an eleven-month period. This yielded a 100% detection rate of manually observed defects, with two times the number of anomalies detected compared to manual inspections.
IOrail is available for suitable commercial partners to bring to market across Southeast Asia.
