Interface - The Journal of Wheel/Rail Interaction

OPTIMIZATION

Monitoring Vehicle/Track Interaction on Amtrak's NEC
(continued)

With 80% of the NEC laid with concrete ties, wheel impact loads are a concern. Amtrak has installed Wheel Impact Load Detector (WILD) systems on the North and South segments of the Corridor; additional WILD systems will be added to provide broader coverage. These tools enable Amtrak to look at the distribution of loads from any train passing an impact detector (see Figure 1). By tracking impact data, Amtrak will be able to identify the trend associated with skid flats that generate out-of-round wheels, which are removed when they trigger an alarm at the 90-kip impact level. Eventually, Amtrak expects to establish automated triggers that enable the database to flag cars that have wheels showing increasing impact levels before they reach the alarm level. "Our hope is that we can catch, fix and save the wheel and bearings before they damage the track," Trosino said.

In addition to impact detectors, Amtrak also installed laser-based angle-of-attack measuring equipment, (see "Designing Amtrak's Wayside Train/Track Interaction Detection System") which provides information on angle of attack, skewed axles, skewed truck and tracking position. (New, in-motion, wheel profile-measuring equipment will be installed at the coach yard at Sunnyside, N.Y.) By examining angle-of-attack data, Amtrak can identify cars that consistently run in a skewed condition past the detector. These cars can be culled from the fleet before they generate sharp wheel flanges or prematurely wear the gauge face of the rail.

Amtrak recently developed a Track Route Database that tracks vehicle movements by car number (using AEI tags), train consist and the route (by track number) that each car has taken on the NEC. Amtrak is further developing a database that will link vehicles, running gear components, vehicle condition measurements, train consist, track route and track condition measurements (see "Developing an Enterprise Asset Management system for Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor.") "This will further help us understand what is actually happening on the system," he said.

Amtrak is also developing a vehicle database to measure the train/track forces generated by every car operating on the corridor. This will enable Amtrak to monitor dynamic vehicle/track conditions and develop proactive track and vehicle maintenance programs based on performance trends.

Utilizing its wayside data collection equipment and the monitoring capabilities of the database, Amtrak expects to be able to identify "bad acting" vehicles in near real time. This will enable Amtrak to determine utilization of the infrastructure by different service providers, by train routes and by the condition of the fleets, Trosino said. "This will let us see how much it's costing us to maintain our track for other users and, ultimately, to start recouping some of those costs."

< PREVIOUS PAGE | PAGE 2 OF 2