JPH0350068A - Track inspecting device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To photograph the images of objects to be inspected positively from a running vehicle even in case the objects to be inspected are placed at random by providing an image photographing means for taking the image on the track in on the basis of a signal discriminated the specific structure on the track by discriminating means. CONSTITUTION:Energy beams are irradiated to a structure on a track 16 from a sensor 10, and the energy beams reflected from the track are received. This received signal passes through discriminating means 2, 3, 4 for performing at least two discriminatings or more among the distance between a track inspecting device and the structure, the sense of direction of the structure and the size (dimension) of the structure, thus detecting the specific structure on the track 16. On the basis of this detection signal, the image of the object to be inspected on the track is then photographed by a TV camera 12. The image of all the objects to be inspected can be thus photographed positively even if many objects to be inspected are randomly placed on the track as well as a vehicle mounted with the track inspecting device is running at high speed.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention (Field of Industrial Application) The present invention relates to a track inspection device for inspecting tracks laid on the ground from a running track vehicle. The present invention relates to a track inspection device that photographs an image of an object to be inspected based on the determination result of the presence of a structure.

(Prior Art) Railway tracks are generally used under harsh conditions. However, for safe running of vehicles, track management is essential, and it is necessary to monitor all structures on the track.

Therefore, conventional track inspections have been carried out by a person actually walking on the track visually or by using a measuring device, etc., except for some cases such as rail deviations.

(Problem to be solved by the invention) However, in the conventional measurement method as described above, there was a problem in that a large amount of labor and time was required for humans to walk on the track. The object of the present invention is to provide a track inspection device that can photograph only essential inspection objects from a moving vehicle and inspect the track based on the photographed images. That is.

(Means for solving the problem) In order to achieve the above object, the track inspection device of the present invention has the following features:
a) transmitting means for irradiating an energy beam onto orbit;
(b) receiving means for receiving an energy beam reflected from orbit; (C) determining means for determining the presence of a specific structure on said orbit from a signal received by said receiving means; and (d) said determining means. and imaging means for capturing an image on the orbit based on a signal determined by the means to identify a specific structure on the orbit. Preferably, the determining means includes at least two of distance determining means, orientation determining means, and dimension determining means.

(Operation) In the present invention, an energy beam is irradiated onto a structure on orbit, and an energy beam reflected from on orbit is received. This received signal is passed through a determining means that determines at least two of the distance from the track inspection device to the structure, the orientation of the structure, and the size (dimensions) of the 4I structure on the orbit. After detecting a specific structure, an image of the object to be inspected on the orbit is taken based on this detection signal.

a specific composition on the orbit detected by the discriminator;
The inspection object to be imaged needs to have a substantially constant positional relationship, and may be the same object.

In this way, even if there are a large number of randomly inspected objects on the track and the vehicle is equipped with a track inspection device or is traveling at high speed, it is possible to reliably capture images of all the inspected objects. .

The quality of the object to be inspected can be automatically determined by passing the captured image through an image processing device on the spot or after taking it home, or it can be determined by a human being by looking at the image. good.

(Example) Hereinafter, an example of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a diagram conceptually showing a configuration example of the present invention.

In FIG. 1, the measuring means 1 consists of a transmitting means for irradiating an energy beam onto the orbit, and a receiving means for receiving the energy beam reflected from the orbit. The signal from the measuring means 1 is input to the determining means 6, where it is determined whether there is a specific structure on the trajectory. In this case, the determining means 6 is shown as having all of the distance determining means 2, the orientation determining means 3, and the dimension determining means 4. When the determining means 6 determines a specific structure on the orbit, it outputs a determination signal indicating this to the imaging means 5. The imaging means 5 takes in an image of the object to be inspected on the orbit based on this discrimination signal.

FIGS. 2 and 3 IN show a more specific embodiment of the track inspection bag δ.

The embodiments shown in Figures 2 and 3 are related to loosening inspection of rail fastening bolts that fix rails to sleepers, and show a system δ that automatically takes images of fastening bolts from a running vehicle. ing.

In FIG. 2, the entire device consisting of 10, 11, 12° 12', 13, 13' 14 is gtted onto a vehicle 15 which is traveling by wheels 15b supported by axles 15a. An ultrasonic sensor IO corresponding to the measuring means 1 in FIG. 1 regularly measures at least two of the following: the distance to a structure on the track, the orientation of the structure, and the dimensions of the structure. By inputting this measured value to the sleeper discrimination means 11 corresponding to the discrimination means 6 in FIG. 1, the sleeper discrimination means 11, which is a specific structure on the track, is discriminated. By inputting the sleeper discrimination signal to the TV camera and strobe for the 112i-th imaging means 5, an image of the rail fastening bolt 18, which is the object to be inspected, is automatically photographed. (Actually, signals are input to the TV left camera controller 12' and strobe controller 13', and the TV left camera 2
．． Take an image using strobe 13. ) The photographed images are stored in the image memory 14.

In this embodiment, the sleeper 17, which is not the object to be inspected, is detected when taking an image of the rail fastening bolt 18, which is the object to be inspected, for the following reason. When the vehicle 15 passes through a curve, the object mounted under the vehicle floor (that is, the ultrasonic sensor 10) is placed on the axle (in reality, the ultrasonic sensor is not placed at this position). difficult,) move perpendicular to the longitudinal direction of the rail.

Therefore, even if the Hg wave sensor 10 is placed directly above the rail fastening bolt 18 and detects the rail fastening bolt 18 on a straight rail section, when the vehicle passes through a curve.

The ultrasonic sensor IO does not necessarily pass over the rail fastening bolt 18, and there is a possibility that this detection cannot be performed. On the other hand, the sleepers 17 correspond to the rail fastening bolts 18 in a one-to-one correspondence, and are also long enough in the vertical direction of the rail length, so there is no problem even if the sensor moves in this direction.

FIG. 3 is a top view of FIG. The ultrasonic sensor 10 is arranged directly downward in the center of the vehicle to detect the sleeper 17, and the TV left camera 2 and strobe 13 are located on the rail 16 with the fastening bolt 18.
(The angle of view of the TV camera is sufficiently large that the fastening bolt 18 can be photographed even if the camera is displaced in the longitudinal direction of the rail.)

Next is the ultrasonic sensor lO, sleeper discrimination means! Sleeper discrimination using l will be explained. Ultrasonic sensors (1) usually calculate the distance between the sensor and a structure on orbit by measuring the time it takes for an ultrasonic pulse emitted from the sensor to be reflected on the surface of an object to be inspected and return to the sensor. It can be determined as a parameter. However, on a general track consisting of sleepers and gravel, the sleepers and gravel are on almost the same height plane, so it is difficult to distinguish the sleepers just by looking at them.

On the other hand, even if the reflecting surface is rough, ultrasonic waves have the property of being reflected in the direction of specular reflection where the angle of incidence and the angle of reflection are equal to the reflecting surface. By utilizing this property, it is possible to distinguish between sleepers facing directly above and gravel facing in any direction. In other words, as shown in Fig. 4, if the ultrasonic waves emitted from the sensor IO are incident on the sleeper facing directly above, it will be reflected directly above and return to the sensor IO, but it does not necessarily have to be directly above the sleeper. If it hits gravel that is not facing the right direction, it will be reflected in a direction different from directly above and the sensor 10
In other words, sleepers 17 and gravel 19 can be distinguished also by the second parameter, the direction of the reflecting surface of the structure (that is, the intensity of the received reflected ultrasound). This corresponds to determining the orientation of the first structure.

The gravel 19 faces in any direction, and some of them, like the sleepers 17, face directly above. in this case,
Since the ultrasonic waves return to the sensor lO in the same way as when they are reflected by the sleeper 17, erroneous detection may occur if only the direction is determined.

Therefore, in order to perform even more accurate discrimination, it is necessary to use not only direction discrimination but also another discrimination method, that is, size discrimination to identify the widths of sleepers and gravel in the direction of vehicle travel. FIG. 5 shows the time change in the reflected ultrasonic intensity, which is the intensity of the ultrasonic wave directed directly below from the sensor 1O under the running vehicle, reflected from the track surface, and received by the sensor again. Wide mountains are caused by sleepers, while narrow mountains are caused by gravel. This width corresponds to the "↑J" of the reflecting objects (sleepers, gravel) on the orbit, that is, the dimension of the structure, which is the third parameter, and this "
By using the dimension determining means and orientation determining means for determining ['', sleepers and gravel can be determined with high accuracy.

Furthermore, since the width of the time axis in Fig. 5 depends on the vehicle speed,
Vehicle speed information is required for the dimension determination means. However, it is not necessarily necessary to detect the vehicle speed information by other means, because the vehicle speed does not vary significantly between several consecutive sleepers, so based on the information of one sleeper that has already been measured, Since it is possible to predict whether the detection time of the sleeper to be detected on the time axis is 1 hour + tJ, it is possible to distinguish only the sleeper from this.

From the above explanation, it may seem that the distance determining means is not necessarily necessary.

However, if there is a structure other than the sleepers, such as a tread on a railroad crossing, that faces directly above, the condition may be that the height is different from the top surface of the sleepers, or the first By using information regarding the parameter (distance to structure #), it becomes possible to select only sleepers. This also applies to tracks without gravel, such as iron bridges. Furthermore, even if no sleepers are present, it is sufficient if there is a specific structure that can be detected at a position corresponding to the rail fastening bolt.

Further, if the sensor can be placed close to the axle, it is also possible to directly identify the rail fastening bolt to be photographed using the ultrasonic sensor.

Next, the imaging system will be explained. T from a moving vehicle
When an orbit is photographed using a V-camera, the photographing time of one frame of a TV camera is usually 1/60 seconds, so the image of the orbit obtained is blurred. To solve this problem, use a strobe with sufficiently short flash duration and strong flash intensity.

That is, in the frame when the sleepers are identified and the strobe is emitted, an image of the rail fastening bolts is captured by the illumination light of the strobe, thereby obtaining a static image of the bolts.

In order to conduct an actual bolt loosening inspection using this image, it is necessary to visualize the bolt loosening by some method. This method involves drawing a white line in a fixed direction on the head surface of the bolt when tightening the bolt, and determining whether the bolt has become loose based on the rotation angle of the white line, or attaching a locking fitting when tightening the bolt and preventing the bolt from becoming loose. There are methods to determine whether a bolt is loose or not, depending on the condition (if the fastening bolt is loose, the fitting will come off). If the looseness of the bolt can be visualized in this way, it can be determined by looking at the image of the bolt brought home, or by using an image processing device, the bolt can be visualized on the spot or after the image is taken home. By image processing, it is possible to automatically inspect fastening bolts on the track.

The above has described the inspection of rail fastening bolts using sleepers, but the present invention is not limited thereto. It can be used as a track inspection device δ for performing many track inspections using images.

(Effects of the Invention) According to the track inspection device of the present invention, the inspection target is Since the specific components necessary for photographing an image are detected, even if the object to be inspected is randomly located, the image can be reliably photographed from a moving vehicle. Therefore, by mounting such a track inspection device on a running vehicle and photographing images of the objects to be inspected, it is possible to obtain images of a large number of objects to be inspected in a short period of time. Combined with this, track inspection can be almost automated,
Track management can be made much more efficient than before.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram conceptually showing the configuration of the present invention. FIG. 2 is a side view of the configuration of the embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 3 is a plan view of the embodiment of the tJSZ diagram, and FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram of sleeper discrimination. FIG. 5 is an explanatory diagram of an ultrasonic signal. [Explanation of symbols of main parts] l...Measuring means 2... Distance determining means 3...
・・・・・・Direction determination means 4・・・・・・・・・・・・
・Dimension determination means 5... Imaging means 6... Discrimination means lO... Ultrasonic sensor 11... ...Sleeper discrimination means 12-...
...TV camera 13...Strobe 6...Rail 7...Sleeper 8... Rail fastening bolt 9...
... Gravel Figure 4

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A transmitting means for irradiating an energy beam onto an orbit; a receiving means for receiving an energy beam reflected from an orbit; and a signal received by the receiving means to identify a specific structure on the orbit. A track inspection device comprising: a discriminating means for discriminating the presence of a specific structure on the orbit; and an imaging means for capturing an image on the orbit based on a signal by which the discriminating means identifies a specific structure on the orbit. . 2. The track inspection device according to claim 1, wherein the determining means includes at least two of distance determining means, direction determining means, and dimension determining means. 3. The trajectory inspection device according to claim 2, wherein the energy beam is an ultrasonic beam.