• Abstract and Figures
• Public Full-text

MDP-07/09MDP-07/09

PROJECT REPORT

ON

Course Director :- Shri A.K.Agarwal/SPME/RSC/BRC

Project Co-ordinator :- Shri A.K.Srivastava/SPS&T/RSC/BRC

 Kailash Sharma Dy.CSTE/IRPMU  Sandeep Maheshwari Dy FA&CAO/C/LKO  J.P. Pandey DPO/MB/NR  R.S.Mishra STM/CORE/ALD  B.C.Roy EME(M&P)/GRC/SER INDEX

S.No. Content Page No.

1 Acknowledgement 3

2 Introduction 4-5

3 Synopsis 6

4 Existing/Present System 7-8

5 Proposed system 9-10

6 What is OFC 11-13

7 Case Study 14-15

8 Cost v/s benefit analysis 16-18

9 Conclusion 19

2 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

We hereby convey our sincere thanks to Railway Staff College, Vadodara and our

Course Director Shri A.K.Agarwal/SPME/RSC/BRC for his monumental efforts to provide us an opportunity to present and express our ideas for the betterment of Indian Railways and to create an environment for making this course a useful to us. We are extremely thankful to our Project Co-ordinator Shri A.K.Srivastava/SPS&T/RSC/BRC for his invaluable guidance and positive directions, which made the expression of this idea possible.

Nevertheless, We are extremely thankful to our Dy. DG and other august faculty members for their sincere efforts towards making this course useful one as well as stay at

RSC a memorable one.

We are thankful to Shri Masood Alam Dy.CSTE/IRPMU for his valuable inputs on preparation of this report.

We are thankful to Shri Rajmal Khoiwal/Sr.DSTE/MB for his support on preparation of this report.

All Members of this Project Study Group - II

3 IntroductionIntroduction

A lot of Constructions/Replacement/Improvement works are a continuous affair all across Indian Railways. These Constructions/Replacement/Improvement works are primarily related to P-way, Signalling, Telecom and Traction Deptt., working together or independently depending upon the nature of construction work. The S&T works comprise of Panel Interlocking, Route Relay Interlocking, Solid state Interlocking, Automatic Signaling work and Gate Interlocking works etc. The major part of signaling works are cabling and interlocking. The cabling is an outdoor activity and interlocking is an indoor activity. The cabling involves two purposes viz. feeding power to various signaling gears like signals, point machines, track circuits etc. and for detection purposes for all signaling gears. i.e. for knowing the current status of the particular gear. At present the cabling is done with signaling cable of Copper conductor for both powering as well as detection of the gear. Roughly at a four line roadside station the requirement of cable is 400-core km for a PI or SSI. With so much of cabling we have Cost of the work is very high on account of cost of cables. Presence of too much of cables in the yard make the gears failure prone due to cable failure which happens due to a lot of other track maintenance activities in the yard. A lot of track crossing is involved which increases the chances of cable damage. Maintenance (testing/meggering) of signaling cable is time consuming activity. which require huge traffic block or gear disconnection. It causes heavy detention of trains during the NI and Cable testing. In case of a cable cut in the yard due to any reason like maintenance activities on the track (deep screening, ballast cleaning etc.) or yard remodeling, it is very difficult to rectify signaling cable if it damaged as the cable consists of multiple cores/conductors. And Conductor to Conductor matching is required in order to ensure that appropriate supply voltage goes to appropriate gear and detection of various gears do not get mixed. As once there is a wrong connection of conductor pair even in the same cable , the result may be disastrous. For example in place of “occupied track” if the information goes as “track clear” or in place of “point normal” if the information goes as “point reverse” then the central interlocking in the relay room may take a wrong decision in regards to “signal

4 clearance” which may cause a catastrophic train accident. And all this will happen due to a wrong connection of any conductor of the damaged cable. New gear like inclusion of new points, new signals and new tracks are introduced in the yard due to Yard remodeling. The cabling of such gears is very cumbersome i.e. all sorts of cables goes from gear concerned to relay room which involves too much of cabling work as well as there are chances of damage of previously existing underground cable.

In this project we propose to use OFC (to the maximum extent possible) instead of present signalling copper cable . OFC cable is comparatively much cheaper, free from theft and easy to handle . OFC cable supports multiplexed data i.e. we can send much more of yard data to relay room on the same cable. This will save the number of cables to be laid from site to relay room. Cost of work will reduce substantially because the cost of work consists of cost of items supplied and execution cost. The cable forms the major chunk of the supply items in terms of costing and also the cable laying part is quite significant component of the execution of the work. Yard will have much lesser cable underground as in place of bunches of heavy signalling cables only few OFC cable will be required, thus percentage chances of cable failures will be reduced drastically.

Internationally the cabling practice is already in very mature stage. The methods of laying cable under plane surface, rocky areas, on bridges, in tunnels, on culverts, Crossing below the track and crossing below the roads are very much advance in terms of technology.

There is much to offer in the proposed system of cabling as we will see in the project report.

5 SynopsisSynopsis

This project report is a brief expression of our conceptualized idea came out of our endeavor to analyse the system of existing cable laying which is very important aspect of any Signalling & Telecom or Electrical work, and to emphasize the use of OFC cable in place of copper cable to the extent possible . The intricacies and complexity of cable laying and the sensitivity of cable connections are some of the areas that we will discuss. The drawbacks of the existing system of cable laying will be revealed out and the scheme of cabling using OFC will be discussed along with the inherent advantages of the proposed system. The fact will be established that how the proposed system will tackle the challenges that are not being taken care by the existing system. There are additional benefits that will be available to us if we use OFC cables in cable laying. The cost benefit analysis will be shown. During the course of the project report we will be using the case studies of Moradabad Division of Northern Railway and some ongoing project being done all across the Indian Railways. Some tables, diagrams, charts and photographs are being used to facilitate in expressing facts and depicting the new concept in a practical manner as well as to arrive at logical and meaningful conclusion.

6 Existing/Existing/ PresentPresent systemsystem

Relay Room

Cu cable

OFC cable EXISTING CABLING SYSTEM

In the present system of cabling as we can see in the diagram above all the gears like track circuit signals and points and sidings if any are connected by cables of different sizes, to the central relay room. The sizes of cables for different gears are as below

 30 core cable for signals  24 core cable for point  19 core cable for Level Crossing gate  12 core cable for track circuit

These cables serves the purpose of feeding power to operate different gears and to have detections of various kinds for the gears. For e.g. signals needs supply voltage of 110Volts and detection of whether the signal aspect is green, yellow, double yellow or red. Same is true for other gears also. 7 The relay room gets all the cables in it and these are terminated inside, and then goes to relay logic which then controls the signalling as per the yard conditions which are obtained via detection cables from the field gears. So we can can see that each gear has a full length cable from relay room to gear itself. Now if any damage happens to any cable due to yard activity of civil enginnering, Electrical engineering or S&T itself then the only solution is to identify the cable and reconnect it. Since in RE area the max length of parallelism is defined so one cable can not go end to end for the whole yard. It has to be terminated in between in location boxes for various sizes, i.e. via different location boxes the cable traverse from the gear to relay room. In case of cable failure( Single or multiple cables) one has check all the location boxes in the zone to localize the cable fault. Once the faulty portion is localised then comes the job of rectifying and testing it. Now here comes more trouble because to before rectifying a cable of say 30 core all the conductors of a cable are to be matched at both ends and these ends may be located at say one k.m. away. This is a heavily time consuming activity and fault some times continues for hours togather causing heavy train detention. In case at any of the ends the cable is connected wrongly due to so many reasons like night hours, lack of communication between two ends or due less competent staff then it may lead to highly unsafe situation. It may happen that point detection gets connected wrongly, giving false information about point setting. Then interlocking can take wrong decision regarding the lowering of the signal and a catastrophic train accident can happen. While doing the route maintenance of signalling gears it is required to test the health of laid cables i.e. to do cable insulation test and cable disconnection test. For this test one has to disconnect the cable at both ends and then conduct the test for each conductor of a cable . During this test gear will remains disconnected and train operation is done on paper authority, causing detention of train during cable testing. When yard remodelling takes place as per traffic requirement then work of cable laying is also one of the major activity. This cable again has to be laid from the newly introduced function to the relay room via different location boxes and that too through a yard which is already packed with so many cables for existing gears. Now there are two situations during the cable laying. One is that it may lead to damage of the existing cables and second is that the new gears have to be terminated at gear end, in relay room and in all in between location boxes from gear to relay room. Then it require testing of not only new gears but also its effect on the existing gears. This activity require heavy traffic block.

8 ProposedProposed systemsystem

Zonal Eqp Hut Zonal Eqp Hut

Zonal Eqp Zonal Eqp Hut Relay Room Hut

Cu cable

OFC cable

PROPOSED CABLING SYSTEM

In the proposed system as can be seen above there are four zonal equipment huts namely Up East, Up West, Dn East and Dn west. These huts have their definite territory depending upon the movement of traffic. Each hut is feeds as well as detect the gears ( Point, Siganls, L/C gate and track circuits) of its own territory. Since these zonal huts are placed very close to the gears its territory, the cable to be laid from zonal hut to function/gear is of small length. These cable will be signalling Copper cable as in existing practice but of very small size. These huts are connected to the central relay room with one power cable and one OFC cable in a ring system as shown above. The power cable will carry power from Central relay room to each zonal hut and the OFC cable will carry the detection status of all the gears in its territory in the fashion as shown above.

9 There is no need to lay bunches of cables from zonal hut to relay room. Therefore huge reduction in cable requirement. Also reduction in the complexity involved for termination and testing of cable. Hence saving in the traffic block. Each zonal hut will have the detection data of the gears of its territory . inside the zonal hut the detection data will be converted from electrical form to optical form and will be fed to OFC terminated in the hut. This optical data of each zonal hut will then go to relay room via optical fiber. Each zonal hut equipment will be connected in a manner to act as standby of the other zonal hut equipment. This will ensure that in case of failure of equipment of one zonal hut the other hut will take care of the gears of the faulty one. The ring system of cable connectivity ensures that even if cable either OFC or power cable is cut at one place , no gear will be affected as power or data transfer will be ensured by the other side of ring path. The ring connection of cable and standby arrangement of interlocking equipment will ensure the better reliability and reduced sensitivity of signalling gears. Thus the odd hours movement of the signalling maintenance staff for attending signal failures will be reduced drastically thus improving the working environment and job satisfaction. Since very few cable will be there in yard as per the proposed scheme it will be easier to handle and locate the cables and better techniques of cable laying and track crossing like blowing and trenchless boring etc. can be used. Hence cables can be secured and protected in a better way. The cost in the new system on cable account will be much cheaper as compared to the old system. As cost of OFC is almost one third of that of Signalling cable. Also one fiber can carry data equivalent to data carried by ten’s of signalling cables. i.e. cost of cabling will is reduced to more than one tenth. But since data conversion from electrical to Optical and back needs additonal equipment , the overall cost of work will remain approximately same. If the benefits are taken into account then the proposed system offer much higher benefits with no cost escalation .

10 What an Optical Fibre cable is ? An optical fiber (or fibre) is a glass or plastic fiber which are widely used in fiber-optic communications, which permits transmission over longer distances and at higher bandwidths than other forms of communications. Fibers are used instead of metal wires because signals travel along them with less loss, and they are also immune to electromagnetic interference.

Principle of Operation

Light is kept in the core of the optical fiber by total internal reflection. This causes the fiber to act as a waveguide. Joining lengths of optical fiber is more complex than joining electrical wire or cable. The ends of the fibers must be carefully cleaved, and then spliced together either mechanically or by fusing them together with an electric arc. Special connectors are used to make removable connections.An optical fiber is a cylindrical dielectric waveguide that transmits light along its axis, by the process of total internal reflection.

Index of refraction The index of refraction is a way of measuring the speed of light in a material. The typical value for the cladding of an optical fiber is 1.46. Thus a phone call carried by fiber between Sydney and New York, a 12000 kilometre distance, means that there is an absolute minimum delay of 60 milliseconds between when one caller speaks to when the other hears.

Total internal reflection When light traveling in a dense medium hits a boundary at a steep angle, the light will be completely reflected. This effect is used in optical fibers to confine light in the core. Light travels along the fiber bouncing back and forth off of the boundary.

Invention of OFC

Daniel Colladon first described this "light fountain" or "light pipe" in an 1842 Fiber optics, though used extensively in the modern world, is a fairly simple and old technology. Jun-ichi Nishizawa, a Japanese scientist at Tohoku University,

11 invented the graded-index optical fiber in 1964 as a channel for transmitting light from semiconductor lasers over long distances with low loss. Attenuations in modern optical cables are far less than those in electrical copper cables, leading to long-haul fiber connections with repeater distances of 70–150 kilometres . The more robust optical fiber commonly used today utilizes glass for both core and sheath and is therefore less prone to aging processes. It was invented by Gerhard Bernsee in 1973 of Schott Glass in Germany.

Optical Fibre Communication

Optical fibre can be used as a medium for telecommunication and networking because it is flexible and can be bundled as cables. It is especially advantageous for long-distance communications, because light propagates through the fiber with little attenuation compared to electrical cables. This allows long distances to be spanned with few repeaters. Over short distances, such as networking within a building, fiber saves space in cable ducts because a single fiber can carry much more data than a single electrical cable. Fiber is also immune to electrical interference; there is no cross-talk between signals in different cables and no pickup of environmental noise. Non-armored fiber cables do not conduct electricity, which makes fiber a good solution for protecting communications equipment located in high voltage environments such as power generation facilities, or metal communication structures prone to lightning strikes. They can also be used in environments where explosive fumes are present, without danger of ignition. Wiretapping is more difficult compared to electrical connections, and there are concentric dual core fibers that are said to be tap-proof. Although fibers can be made out of transparent plastic, glass, or a combination of the two, the fibers used in long-distance telecommunications applications are always glass, because of the lower optical attenuation. Both multi-mode and single-mode fibers are used in communications, with multi-mode fiber used mostly for short distances, up to 550 m, and single-mode fiber used for longer distance links

Multi-mode fiber

The propagation of light through a multi-mode optical fiber.

12 A laser bouncing down an acrylic rod, illustrating the total internal reflection of light in a multi-mode optical fiber.Fiber with large core diameter of 10 micrometers, may be analyzed by geometric optics. Such fiber is called multi-mode fiber, from the electromagnetic analysis . In a step-index multi- mode fiber, rays of light are guided along the fiber core by total internal reflection. Rays that meet the core-cladding boundary at a high angle , greater than the critical angle for this boundary, are completely reflected. The critical angle is determined by the difference in index of refraction between the core and cladding materials. Rays that meet the boundary at a low angle are refracted from the core into the cladding, and do not convey light and hence information along the fiber. The critical angle determines the acceptance angle of the fiber, often reported as a numerical aperture. A high numerical aperture allows light to propagate down the fiber in rays both close to the axis and at various angles, allowing efficient coupling of light into the fiber. However, this high numerical aperture increases the amount of dispersion as rays at different angles have different path lengths and therefore take different times to traverse the fiber. A low numerical aperture may therefore be desirable.

Materials

Glass optical fibers are almost always made from silica.

13 PRESENT FAULT PATTERN IN YARD

A CASE STUDY OF MORADABAD YORD

MONTH S&T ENGG OPTG O/S OTHERS TOTAL % DUE OTHERS FAILURE TO DUE TO CABLES CABLING APR 09 45 12 44 04 09 04 118 38 MAY 09 33 08 16 02 05 02 66 50 JUN 09 27 06 13 02 16 01 65 41 JUL 09 17 04 11 01 10 09 52 32 AUG 09 23 07 07 01 14 02 54 42 SEP 09 16 05 07 0 07 03 37 43

By analysing the above fault pattern it is significant that almost 50% of the yard failures are attributed to the cable fault either due to cable cut by way of various reasons or the failure of cable itself. In proposed system of OFC cabling, number of cables are reduced substantially and if at all cable is cut it is very easy to join the cable with help of splicing kit within 15 minutes thereby traffic destruption is also reduced. With the available technologies of cable laying it is possible to blow the OFC cable through pipes , which makes it very easy to lay or replace a cable.

MAN POWER DEPLOYMENT IN MURADABAD YARD

DESIGNATION NUMBERS SE 01 JE 02 MCM 01 ESM 09 MSM 05 H/KH 16 TOTAL 34

14 By analyzing above manpower deployment, it is pertinent to mention that a large number of non-technical man power are deployed for yard maintenance. In proposed system of cabling lesser manpower will be required to maintain the system. It will reduce the manpower thereby reducing the establishing cost of railway even in long run. Lesser manpower but technical manpower will be a boon for railway working.

In proposed system cable joining and replacement is easy, however in old scheme almost three employees were required to even identify the fault and even more manpower to rectify it. Fault in odd hours causes more TA and OT payment to the staff in old scheme of cabling. Frequent failures not only causes traffic disruption but also acts as demoralizing factor of staff. Thus the proposed scheme of cabling is beneficial in man power point of view also.

15 COST V/S BENEFIT ANALYSIS

During normal course of action, while discussing and analyzing any new project the cost-benefits analysis is narrowed down to “Financial Viability” only, though on the contrary it may only be part of that. The layman analysis of any project is incorrectly summarized to traditional methods of financial analysis like:  Present Value or discounted present value  Internal Rate of Return  Payback period etc Although these methods are very useful and important to judge the financial viability of the project, yet these are mere parameters of “Financial Returns” on investment. However the cost-benefit analysis is much more than it and it is pertinent to mention here particularly in reference to Railways, That: 1. Railway is not merely a commercial organization rather it has to cater the expectations as well as strategic, social and economic needs of the country and its employees. 2. SWOT analysis should be done thoroughly so that the impact of present investments should be justified in view of future opportunities and threats also. 3. Technology is problem only when it is not approachable, when there is a free flow of ‘technical know-how’, the decision becomes more capital/investment oriented based on over all cost-benefit analysis.

In the current system of total Copper cable scheme the total cost of a PI/SSI at a four line way side station is approx. 70 lakh rupees, and that too with very poor system reliability. The cost of the new signaling system with OFC cabling for detection purposes and Copper cable for powering purposes may be seem to be somewhat more in comparison to the present system’s cost based on traditional methods of judging ‘financial viability’ as discussed above, However while broadening the ‘financial viability’ to ‘cost-benefit analysis’ we see a lots of tangible and intangible benefits also:

Tangible Benefits:

16  Cost of work (Cabling) is very high, If instead of Copper cable we use OFC which is quite cheap multiplexed data can flow in the same OFC cable. The cost of cable repair/theft and replacement of cable in future course will be significant.  Too much of cables in the yard make the gears failure prone due to cable failure which happens due to a lot of other track maintenance activities in the yard. In OFC cabling system yard will have much lesser cable underground, thus percentage chances of cable failures will also be markably reduced.  It causes heavy detention of trains during the NI and Cable testing, whereas in OFC cabling since the number of terminations are very less so the connection and testing of cables become easy thereby needing very less time for NI and reduction in train detention.  When any new gear comes up due to Yard remodelling the cabling of the that gear goes for full length i.e. from gear to relay room which involves too much of cabling work as well as there are chances of damage of existing underground cable, whereas with the use of OFC cable, minimum track crossings of cable will be involved, further in the proposed system of cabling the newly introduced gear due to yard remodeling will be connected to its own “Zonal Equipment Hut” only reduction in quantity of cable.  In case of a cable cut due to any reason, it is very difficult to rectify Signalling cable of say multiple core cable (Conductor to Conductor matching is required), whereas in case of cable cut it is very easy to rectify an OFC cable. (No conductor-to-conductor matching is required).  Existing signaling cable, which is of copper material, is theft prone, whereas OFC cable is hardly resalable in market and also very cheap in cost therefore it is not theft prone.  Even if the cable gets damaged in the existing system there is no standby system to take care of the fault and to ensure that train running is not affected but with the proposed system if the cable fails there will be another cable via other route which will be act as standby and will ensure that the train running is not affected.  If the microlok equipment which takes care of interlocking circuits gets damaged or faulty then there is a provision in the proposed system that second microlok will act as standby to the faulty equipment and will ensure that microlok equipment failure will not hamper the train operation.

Thus the decision is – whether to save present investment or to save heavy cost to be incurred in future.

17 Intangible Benefits:  Enhancing the morale and motivation of railway staff.  Effective discharge of social and economic responsibility.  Easiness in working and flexibility of repair times-not much requirement to rush in night.  Goodwill of the organisation particularly in the state of globalisation and concept of Global Village.

Hence; the proposed introduction of new technology in cabling pattern of signalling is successfully satisfying each and every ‘acid-test’ of ‘cost-benefit-analysis’ and is perfectly Economic-Effective-Efficient.

18 CONCLUSION

It is herby concluded from the above study that this is the right time to change the cabling scheme in signaling to improve the reliability of the system, and reliability can only be improved by reducing the number of gears, making provisions for sufficient standby arrangements and reducing the number of joints/terminations in the cables. The proposed cabling pattern not only reduces the number of gears and joints/ terminations but also provides the sufficient alternative paths and standby equipments in much economical way.

And nevertheless just give a thought to:

While making skyscrapers, why do we make strong foundations with huge investments – are these ‘financially viable’ based on return on investments? Similarly while deciding the introduction of new technology it should be kept in mind that it is a ‘foundation’ of highly remunerative ‘skyscrapers’ projects upcoming in future.

&

‘Omnia mutantur, nos et mutamur in illis’ -Times change and we with time:

If it is not the rule of nature – why not “HORSE SIGNALLING”.

*******************

19 Zonal Eqp Hut Zonal Eqp Hut

Zonal Eqp Hut Zonal Eqp Relay Room Hut

PROPOSED CABLING SYSTEM

20

Load more

  20

Copy Link