Automated Crack Detection System for Railway Track Health Monitoring System
Abstract
This project introduces an innovative Crack Detection System designed for automated inspection and monitoring of railway track surfaces in infrastructure. There are many complex and different applications where the accuracy of the structures is meant to be flawless. Small error in design or make can ruin a machine or a structure. Many methods are employed to make sure that after production of any part or machine there should be no flaws in the shape or structure of that part. But due to some circumstances or faults flaws like cracks in body can occur. To check for these cracks we propose a method in this project. After having weighed up all our options, we have chosen the cheaper means of a LED-LDR based detection which provides us with ruggedness and reasonably accurate crack detection. The simplicity of our idea and the easy-availability of the components make our project ideal for implementation on a large scale with very little initial investment.
In this project we are using optical sensor method to determine whether the metal has any crack or not. The optical sensor will be a set of bright LEDs and LDR. LDR (Light Dependent Resistor) has a unique property of varying its resistance according to the amount of light falling on it. On low light conditions the resistance increases while on increasing the brightness of light its resistance decreases.
In our project we will make a frame with led and LDR at opposite ends and in between we will place any metal or plastic material. When the led and LDR arrangement will scan the material, the value of LDR resistance will depend on the LED light. Where there are no cracks the light will not pass through the metal, but in case of a crack the light will pass through the metal to the LDR. This will decrease the LDR resistance and it will be noted by the microcontroller. The microcontroller on detecting a crack will raise alarm by blinking a LED and buzzer for sound alarm.
