Authors:
Nithin Srinivasan,RM. Kuppan Chetty,Oh Joo Ztat,Manju Mohan,A. Joshuva,DOI NO:
https://doi.org/10.26782/jmcms.2020.05.00023Keywords:
Railroad Track Inspection,Visual Perception,Mobile Robot,Image Processing,Image Analysis,Abstract
Railroad track inspection is essential to guarantee safe operation condition for the rails to travel on. Even though railway sector invests hefty costs, time and strong human workforce to ensure the performance and safety of the railroads, frequent accident occurs throughout the year due to poor visual inspection carried out by the human inspectors. The quality of inspection remains a question mark and deteriorates progressively when the experienced human inspectors are made to carry out the inspection all along the railroads exposing them to mental fatigue and other potential health hazards. Therefore, in this study, a simple method using visual perception and image processing techniques for the inspection of railroad track for anomalies is presented as an alternate solution to the traditional inspection system. An automated wheeled mobile robot is also prototyped to carry out the inspection on the railroads. This prototyped system uses a visual perception algorithm based on edge detection and feature extraction is developed in LabVIEW, which continuously records the images of the track; assesses and detects the railroad components such as loose bolts, bent boltsand surface cracks, which are very critical for rail safety. The performance of the proposed system is investigated in the laboratory conditions and results show high performance in the detection of railroad track anomalies.Refference:
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