Founded | 1928 |
---|---|
Founder | Elmer Sperry |
Headquarters | , |
Area served | Worldwide |
Services | Rail Inspection |
Website | www.sperryrail.com |
Sperry Rail Service( reporting mark SRSX) is a rail inspection company founded in 1928 by Elmer Ambrose Sperry. [1] The company was the first in the world to offer nondestructive testing of railroad tracks. Since its formation, Sperry has been contracted by most of the major railroads in North America to inspect rail. To accomplish this task, the company operates a fleet of rail service vehicles that travel along railroads to detect defects. [2]
While most prominent in North America, Sperry also operates in South America, Europe, Asia, Africa, and Australia. [1]
By the late 19th century, train derailments, some of which were blamed on transverse fissures, were increasing. [3] One of them occurred in 1911, in Manchester, New York, killing 29 and seriously injuring 60. [4] Another killed 21 and injured over 100 near Victoria, Mississippi, in October 1925. [5]
Dr. Elmer Sperry began developing a method of locating internal rail defects in 1911. To build a railway test car, he contracted the American Railway Association in 1927. Construction on this first car began in June 1927. The body was metal-faced plywood, and was mounted on a Kalamazoo motor car bed. This car was towed by a larger motor car. After completion, it was delivered on December 17, 1927, for performing tests.
An operator, lying flat on his stomach as he was moved along on a hand car, held a "search unit" against the rail. Both fissures were found, but serious difficulties were encountered during the test. This method also posed problems due to uneven rail surfaces.[ citation needed ]
Sperry and his staff discovered a new principle for detecting transverse fissures in 1928, called the "induction method." [2] It also found split-heads and other invisible defects. While a major advancement, this method had its limitations. It did not function properly at the end of each rail where angle bars and bolts held two succeeding rails together, or where two rails converged such as at switch points. These rail parts had to be examined individually by a hand-held ultrasonic scanner.
The induction system was augmented by mobile semi-automated ultrasonic inspection equipment in 1960. Today, Sperry performs both induction testing and ultrasonic testing with its rail service vehicles. [2]
It would appear that the induction-based testing method equipment replaced the original magnetic equipment on Sperry Rail Service 101. Even though it was completed almost ten months before, the car was rejected by the American Railway Association's Rail Committee until October 2, 1928. After a test run on September 27, 1928, by Dr. Sperry and his research engineer H.C. Drake, it began testing on the New York Central under ARA supervision. The test with the modified 101 was so successful that construction on SRS 102 began almost immediately.[ citation needed ]
The original plan of Dr. Sperry was to build and sell the rail detector cars, along with the testing services, to the railways. However, the railways were reluctant, so Sperry decided to sell the rail inspection service only. [2] It would lead to more consistent testing, which is done by skilled and experienced personnel.
More information about the types of defects that can be found by the Sperry rail car is detailed in this document. [6]
On August 29, 2002, Sperry Rail Service acquired Harsco Corporation's rail flaw detection (RFD) group. Harsco's track maintenance division, also known as Harsco Track Technologies (HTT), was located in Danbury, Connecticut, Sperry's hometown. With this takeover, Sperry's rail flaw detection fleet increased by 30 trucks. Harsco's Rail Flaw Service was previously known as Pandrol Jackson Technologies.[ citation needed ]
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A speeder is a small railcar formerly used around the world by track inspectors and work crews to move quickly to and from work sites. Although slow compared to a train or car, it is called speeder because it is faster than a human-powered vehicle such as a handcar. Motorized inspection cars date back to at least 1896, when it was reported that the U.S. Daimler Motor Company created a gasoline-powered rail inspection car capable of 15 mph (24 km/h).
A defect detector is a device used on railroads to detect axle and signal problems in passing trains. The detectors are normally integrated into the tracks and often include sensors to detect several different kinds of problems that could occur. Defect detectors were one of the inventions which enabled American railroads to eliminate the caboose at the rear of the train, as well as various station agents placed along active routes to detect unsafe conditions. The use of defect detectors has since spread overseas to other railroad systems.
Eddy-current testing is one of many electromagnetic testing methods used in nondestructive testing (NDT) making use of electromagnetic induction to detect and characterize surface and sub-surface flaws in conductive materials.
Predictive maintenance techniques are designed to help determine the condition of in-service equipment in order to estimate when maintenance should be performed. This approach promises cost savings over routine or time-based preventive maintenance, because tasks are performed only when warranted. Thus, it is regarded as condition-based maintenance carried out as suggested by estimations of the degradation state of an item.
Ultrasonic testing (UT) is a family of non-destructive testing techniques based on the propagation of ultrasonic waves in the object or material tested. In most common UT applications, very short ultrasonic pulse waves with centre frequencies ranging from 0.1-15 MHz and occasionally up to 50 MHz, are transmitted into materials to detect internal flaws or to characterize materials. A common example is ultrasonic thickness measurement, which tests the thickness of the test object, for example, to monitor pipework corrosion and erosion. Ultrasonic testing is extensively used to detect flaws in welds.
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A track geometry car is an automated track inspection vehicle on a rail transport system used to test several parameters of the track geometry without obstructing normal railroad operations. Some of the parameters generally measured include position, curvature, alignment of the track, smoothness, and the crosslevel of the two rails. The cars use a variety of sensors, measuring systems, and data management systems to create a profile of the track being inspected.
Phased array ultrasonics (PA) is an advanced method of ultrasonic testing that has applications in medical imaging and industrial nondestructive testing. Common applications are to noninvasively examine the heart or to find flaws in manufactured materials such as welds. Single-element probes, known technically as monolithic probes, emit a beam in a fixed direction. To test or interrogate a large volume of material, a conventional probe must be physically scanned to sweep the beam through the area of interest. In contrast, the beam from a phased array probe can be focused and swept electronically without moving the probe. The beam is controllable because a phased array probe is made up of multiple small elements, each of which can be pulsed individually at a computer-calculated timing. The term phased refers to the timing, and the term array refers to the multiple elements. Phased array ultrasonic testing is based on principles of wave physics, which also have applications in fields such as optics and electromagnetic antennae.
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