Monitoring ‘sandboxes’ on rolling stock in real time

While the large majority of rolling stock use sand to increase wheel-rail adhesion for traction and braking, some conditions significantly decrease vehicle adhesion, such as in the fall, when the presence of plant residues and high humidity make rails ‘greasy.’ In this context, using ‘sandboxes’ to add sand between wheels and rails allows to increase the coefficient of friction and therefore to mitigate adhesion deficiencies.

As a security device, ‘sandboxes’ and their reservoirs must always be in operational condition. Therefore, they are regularly filled with calibrated, dry sand. Storage silos make it possible to supply an entire distribution network.

Unfortunately, sand levels in silos are not monitored in real time. Moreover, consumption via the distribution and filling network is also inaccurate. Without monitoring, in the event of an empty silo, it is impossible to fill rolling stock sandboxes.

Download this Whitepaper to discover how Stimio’s solution makes it possible to monitor sand levels in real time and to predict when a critical threshold is reached.