Quantification of the Effectiveness of Handheld Equipment for Ground Verification of Detected Rail Internal Defects

Details

• Creators:
  Al-Nazer, Leith ; Raslear, Thomas ; Welander, Lucas R.
• Corporate Creators:
  United States. Federal Railroad Administration. Office of Research and Development
• Corporate Contributors:
  Transportation Technology Center, Inc.
• Subject/TRT Terms:
  • Railroad tracks
  • Defects
  • Inspection equipment
  • Probes (Measuring devices)
  • Phased arrays
  • Measures of effectiveness
  • Testing equipment
  • Ultrasonic tests
  • Research Hub
• Publication/ Report Number:
  DOT/FRA/ORD-14/07
• Resource Type:
  Tech Report
• Geographical Coverage:
  United States
• Corporate Publisher:
  United States. Federal Railroad Administration. Office of Research and Development
• Abstract:
  The objective of this project was to quantify the effectiveness of the rail inspection ground verification process. More specifically, the project focused on comparing the effectiveness of conventional versus phased array probes to manually detect and size internal rail defects. Signal detection theory was used to quantify the effectiveness parameter. The results tentatively indicate that phased array technology has approximately the same sensitivity as conventional ultrasonic equipment, but there are preliminary indications that phased array technology may be more effective at sizing internal defects. However, follow-on studies with additional data collection are necessary in order to draw a more definitive conclusion.
• Format:
  PDF
• Download URL:
  https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/28262/dot_28262_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 586.31 KB]
• Collection(s):
  Federal Railroad Administration ; US Transportation Collection
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha256:65922f4420065a19bc06008d882fd5a52994b6ca3b361be275a64ee3daec067a