Remote monitoring of hydraulic point machines for fault diagnosis

The purpose of this thesis is to design a product that is able to monitor the pressure of the hydraulic point machines to aid in the diagnostic of problematic machines. The final product must be a standalone device that is able to monitor the pressure of the hydraulic point machine to provide feedback from remote locations. A method to simplify and reduce the time spent analysing the data received from the device is also required. A description of the track system that the project will be installed on, a review of the operation of the point machines, an overview of the monitoring systems and its configuration is contained in the Project Investigation. The process required to produce the monitoring device and the data analysis method is present in the project methodology. The device that was produced was installed on track and was able to monitor and record the pressure as well as the current of the hydraulic point machine then wirelessly transmit the data recorded back to the user. Once the data was received a VBA program was used to automatically organise and analyse the data received. It should be noted that although the data was received from the device and analysed over a period of time, a detailed analyse of any change of the hydraulic point machine over time was not completed. From the data received a general profile of how the hydraulic machine operates was able to be produced however until it is tested on a faulty machine it is unknown how effective it would be in diagnosing problematic machines. Also from the data analysis it was found that if the device had a higher sampling rate and a larger amount of RAM it would improve the quality of the data received