TRACK EQUIPMENT & MAINTENANCE
start to build a picture for each bearing about the condition it is in: ‘green’, mean- ing no problems, or ‘amber’, for example.
“We usually start the intervention once we have a significant number of passes over this system at an amber level – occasion- ally up to 20 passes. Then we start plan- ning the maintenance. So it’s not about a single pass and warning lights flashing; it’s about plotting a trend for each bearing and deciding what the best time is to intervene from a maintenance point of view as well as from a cost point of view.”
Covering 100% of the fleet was key, he ex- plained, and the Wimbledon-based 455 and 458 fleets obviously never go past the Swaythling device.
Theoretically the system can be used for any type of rolling stock, and it is already helping to monitor fleets owned by other operators whose trains pass the sensors.
Roth explained: “It will give a signal for any train going past the system, but what is needed is the tag on the unit, and for each different type of rolling stock, you have to identify and set the ‘alarm’ levels as well. For example, with the one at Swaythling, if there are significant alarm levels on freight
trains or CrossCountry trains, then usually the information is passed to Network Rail for them to investigate. But, because we don’t have the tags, we cannot identify the specific units involved.”
Asked to quantify the amount of passenger disruption that the technology will help to prevent, Roth said: “In the past, before starting with this type of technology, we probably had about five failures per year, which totalled thousands of delay minutes. With this system, we probably bring that down to one per year because of bearing failures, so it is a substantial improvement.
“The number of delay minutes very much
depends on the area the train failure oc- curs; the closer it is to London, the more disruptive it is to the railway, because of the intensity of the service, and therefore the new Mortlake system is quite crucial to avoid problems in that London area.
“From a whole industry point of view, Net- work Rail and South West Trains do see a cost benefit to putting it in to save delay minutes and improve PPM.”
Other operators are interested in the tech- nology, Roth confirmed, although he said he couldn’t comment on the business case for them.
But he said: “It very much depends on the bearing condition, on the frequency of ser- vice, and the potential for it to be disrup- tive to their services. It’s clear that other operators, and even Network Rail in CP5 or CP6, are looking into similar types of technology for more widespread use across the network.”
Christian Roth
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rail technology magazine Dec/Jan 12 | 39
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