DYNAMIC MEASUREMENT OF THE SIDE RAIL WEAR USING A LASER RANGEFINDER

• Main Author: Prasetia, Rio
• Format: Final Project
• Language: Indonesia
• Online Access: https://digilib.itb.ac.id/gdl/view/43348
• Institution: Institut Teknologi Bandung

Based on the results of investigations of several train crashes, it was found that the condition of railroads and railroad wheels that were not in accordance with the provisions became the main cause of the accident. Rail wear is an important parameter in estimating railroad conditions. If the wear is too high, it can cause a train out of the railroad track. Now, wear measurements are still done manually so that the measurements is not effective and also a long time to do. Aside from doing manual measurements, rail wear is also measured indirectly using a measuring train. Where the value of rail wear is only seen from the widening of the rail along the inspection. To overcome this problem, a wear measurement system of the side rail wear was designed using a laser rangefinder. Measuring wear using a laser rangefinder utilizes the difference in the travel time of the laser signal between the signals sent and received. The difference in travel time will be processed into a distance value considering the laser speed is always constant. The wear value is obtained by reducing the measured distance by reference where the reference is the distance value between the laser to the rail when the rail condition is no wear. Research has been conducted at PT Len Railway Systems (LRS) and PT Kereta Api Indonesia (KAI). Research at PT LRS was conducted to determine the optimum conditions of measurement and to see system performance during dynamic measurements. In this study, the system has a high precision value when the system is isolated from direct sunlight and the measurement distance is in the range of 60-70 mm. From the data processing, the system's accuracy level reaches 1 mm with a standard deviation below 0.6 mm. Research at PT KAI was conducted to determine the value of rail wear around Bandung Station. In this study the measured wear value was calibrated based on the width of the rail track. In testing the wear measurement system on rails R42 and R54 PT KAI it was found that the maximum wear value for R42 type rails was 9 mm and 7 mm for R54 type rails.