2024 Volume 28 Issue 1 Pages 136-143
Improving the efficiency of maintenance is essential to realizing sustainable railways; however, there has been little progress in organizing and sharing existing work across the division, which is essential for introducing effective digital technology. Through joint research with the Railway Technical Research Institute, Shikoku Railway Company is conducting a survey of existing maintenance works across all relating divisions, and is proceeding with sharing and organizing the results. The results of a survey of the actual state of electrical division, including power supply, railway signal, and communications, which is the focus of this study, showed the following characteristics: Inspection of point-switch and track circuits requires more than 40% of the total electrical division labor. Data about inspection results, abnormality responses, constant monitoring, etc. are recorded and stored. Furthermore, the authors presents a vision for optimization of inspection cycles through asset management that utilizes visual inspection records as a digital technology to save labor in maintenance work.
