On-Board Railroad Wheel Monitoring System

The purpose of this Innovations Deserving Exploratory Analysis (IDEA) project was to develop an economical on-board wheel monitoring system for railroad applications that will improve railroad safety by reducing complete component failure. The Autonomous Rolling Stock System (ARMS) will provide warnings to train operators as well as railroad car owners before the component failure occurs such that preventive maintenance can be performed on a scheduled basis. There is currently a patent pending on this system. The ARMS unit is a small electronics package which attaches directly on the outer hub of a train car wheel. It forms its own network and communicates important data and trends to a central data collection unit on the train for transmission to a central database external to the train.