Rail corridors are notoriously troublesome to conduct monitoring using traditional survey methods, so when Darren Dean, Survey Manager and Director of Asset Survey Solutions was starting work on a rail project as part of the LXRP removal projects in Victoria, Mr Dean knew he wanted to get the Senceive FlatMesh Network which was supplied and supported by Aptella, implemented to increase safety for his team whilst streamlining productivity and being cost effective for his clients.
Prior to implementing the Senceive FlatMesh wireless sensor network , Asset Survey Solutions would have had to have multiple surveyors, in person, positioned taking manual recordings. With the recording requirements for this project, the surveyors would have been taking a reading every hour, every day for three months.
“From our side of things, it allowed our resources to be used elsewhere as crews were not physically needed to be there and from a client’s point of perspective the system increases safety and is more cost effective, they’re not paying for multiple crews to be on site, doing this hourly reading when there’s a survey network that can do it all automatically for them,” said Mr Dean.
“Once it’s installed, it’s monitoring 24 hours a day and you don’t have to have a physical surveyor on site.”
One of the main benefits for Asset Survey Solutions is that once the Senceive FlatMesh wireless sensor Network is installed, which occurs during an occupation when the trains are stopped, there is no need for the surveyor to go back into the rail corridor unless it’s to repair a node being damaged.
“Once it’s installed and running, it’s pretty simple to use. The proof is in the pudding, the Senceive FlatMesh Network works, it’s a reliable system and the ease of application is unmatched, I’ve had surveyors using it that have never used a monitoring system before and found it quick and easy to use,” said Mr Dean.
“From a company’s perspective using the Senceive Network saves you time, resources and any risk to the surveying team. From a surveying company’s perspective, it’s a no-brainer. The effectiveness of the Senceive FlatMesh Network far outweighs not using it!”
Mr Dean also found the reporting to be agile enough to provide enough data in the format required for each individual project, with in-depth reporting available or a simple overview which is suitable for people that may not have rail or survey knowledge.
“It’s a really simple system and clients love that we could give them minute-by-minute reports up to day-by-day reports or however they needed it. We had a Google map behind the reporting showing where the nodes were and then we had a traffic light system, if it was orange we knew it had an issue and if it was red we knew we had a problem. Just to have that simple, visual report made it easy for people to digest,” said Mr Dean.
“If the track for example dropped after works and had an above tolerance error, someone without rail or survey knowledge might not understand that’s actually quite a big problem with issue rising from trains being slowed down or delayed to much worse circumstances. So, it just really simplified it for people and I know that the engineers really appreciated that they didn’t have to sit down and learn the background knowledge of the whole system.”
Using the Senceive FlatMesh wireless sensor network also means that not only is the information received very accurate but you also receive so much more information live than a manual survey can provide because the surveyor has to take the recordings and plug it into the software before you can produce a report, whereas the Senceive FlatMesh Network provides instant data and access to the report.
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Aptella Pty Ltd
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