Railway track cleaning machine

Amit Mundada
Amrita School of Engineering, Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, India
Email-amitmundadasj@gmail.com
Jagadeesh.S
Amrita School of Engineering, Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, India
Email-s.jagadeesh003@gmail.com

Abstract
This paper aims to present a prototype for a liquid. Apart from cleaning the tracks, waste
cost efficient Railway track cleaning machine accumulated on the sides of the tracks can also
which would prove to be a wonderful be removed using the proposed prototype. A
alternative to the current system in place if sponge is attached at the end of this
implemented. The proposed prototype is compartment which facilitates absorption of
designed to overcome all the disadvantages of excess water spilled on tracks during rainy
the current machine, and would help seasons. There is also a space provided for the
materialize the idea of super clean railway spare equipment, this space can also be used
tracks across the nation. for people while transporting this locomotive
Keyword: drive shaft, elevator conveyor belt to some other places from the place of
manufacture. Enough empty places are
I. Introduction provided around all the containers to make
repairs with ease.
India is travelling towards the dream “clean
and green”. Mere words create no impact on II. Related works
people. Preaching by action is our motto; our
railway track cleaning machine keeps the
railway track and its surroundings clean. This
will motivate people to keep the city clean
which will in turn help build a clean nation.
Railway track cleaning machine is designed to
provide the best cleaning facility with
minimum power consumption and labour
power. In view of promoting Swach Bharath
Abhiyan, we have come up with this cost and
power efficient prototype. Railways, by virtue
of being a public transport system, is used by
myriads of people and is thus littered
frequently. Our main focus lies on simplifying Fig. 1: This shows the cleaning machine
the process of cleaning as much as possible, designed by Indian Railways.
since tracks are to be cleaned frequently. This Indian railways introduced this cleaning
prototype is designed to remove waste (plastic
machine (designed and developed by Northern
covers, paper cups, polythene covers etc.) and
Railway capable of storing 6MT waste) in
store it in a separate cabin which would enable
March 2014 [1]. Major disadvantage of this
removal of all the wastes at once. The tracks,
machine is that it requires very high power due
can then be cleaned with water at high
to the use of inbuilt vacuum cleaner. Secondly,
pressure, with the latter composed of an equal
this machine is built solely for the purpose of
amount of disinfectant and pleasant smelling
removing waste from the tracks; hence, the
sides of the tracks remain unclean. This
machine also requires a separate engine in
place to be operational. Considerable amount
of human power is also inevitable to control
the working of this machine. Last but not the
least, the design of this system is different
from that of the other commonly used
compartments by the Indian Railways which
makes it quite complicated to manufacture in Fig. 3: Have you ever noticed Railway tracks
other parts of the country other than where it is clean at least for few hours in a day? [4]
developed.
The proposed prototype is designed to
overcome these disadvantages by making use
of technologically more improved and far
efficient techniques.

III. Problem definition

One of the most important challenges faced by
the Indian Railways is maintaining cleanliness
in tracks, which is a tedious process. People Fig. 4: Would you recommend cleaning using
are increasingly depending on railways as it is a automated brushes instead of vacuum cleaners
cost efficient service. This gives rise to in view of energy consumption and safety? [4]
accumulation of waste products. Many
projects have been undertaken by the
government to keep the tracks clean, but the
success rate of these projects are considerably
low. Indian Railways had proposed a machine
to clean the waste accumulated in tracks.
Though it has its advantages, there are some
drawbacks including life threat to workers due
to risky conditions.

Fig. 5: Will you recommend spraying of tracks

with disinfectant? [4]

IV. Solution and

discussion
To solve this problem we have come up with a
prototype which has the following features

Fig. 2: Do you know that India has a machine to Length of compartment- 23.54 meters [2]
collect waste littered in tracks? [4] Width of compartment- 3.24 meters [2]
Height of compartment- 4.03 meters [2]
These are the standard measurements of Indian will be of an arrangement similar to this,
Railways for manufacturing compartments.
Hence any existing compartment can be
modified to suit these needs.
1. A belt which picks all the waste in the
tracks
2. A motor run automated brush which runs
along the sides of tracks to collect all the waste
fi

in a place which can then be cleared using

appropriate methods. Fig. 7: This is a normal type of brush without
replacement [5]
3. A disinfectant mixed with a pleasant
smelling liquid is used to prevent the
communicable diseases and diseases caused
due to lack of cleanliness.
DETAILS OF COMPARTMENT
This compartment can be divided into two
major parts for holding an elevator conveyor
belt with garbage containers and a tank mixed
with disinfectant solution. Fig .8: This is a holder that can be used to hold
bristles [5]
A. Working of conveyor belt
Major portion of the compartment is filled
with an opposite sided elevated conveyor belt
which is run by two motors. Either side of the
belts are garbage containers to collect the
waste with the help of conveyor belt.

Fig. 9: This shows a removable bristle attached

Fig. 6: This shows conveyor belts depositing
waste collected from tracks inside garbage
containers.
These conveyor belts are made of
leather/synthetic material which has bristles of
0.91 meters in length and 1.82 meters wide all
over it separated by 0.3 meters. These bristles
can be made of recycled plastic. Bristles are
placed in such a way that damaged bristles can
be removed and replaced with new ones with
ease. Bristles arrangement on conveyor belt
to a holder [5]
Garbage containers on either side of the
conveyor belts are made up of light-weight
aluminum containers. A cover is wrapped
inside these containers to make it easy to
remove waste when the container is full. These
containers are 4.09 meters in length ,3.51
meters by height and 2.8 meters wide. A
hollow space is created so that waste can be
removed manually. Second pair of bristles are
arranged on either front sides of the
compartment facilitating the cleaning on the
sides of track. On either side of the track there
would be static bristle and rotating bristles.
Rotating bristles are arranged to rotate in
outward direction from the track so that waste
gets accumulated outside the tracks. A C-
shaped hard brush which is beneath this
rotating brush bristles collects all the waste
thrown outward from track by rotating bristles.
The rotating motion for the bristles is
facilitated by two motors that runs the
conveyor belts. Speed of the rotating bristles
on the sides of the compartment can be
optimized based on the speed of the train it is
attached.
Length of rotating brushes:0.52 meters
Radius of C-shaped brushes arc:0.91 meters
B. Water Storage
Remaining space of the compartment is filled
with a cylindrical galvanized steel
compartment to hold the disinfectant solution
which shares 1/4th of total size. This is
designed in such a way to prevent wastage of
water by stagnation.Cylindrical shape of
container will be similar to this
arrangement.
Disin
fe-
ctant
soln.
Fig. 10: This shows the arrangement of storage
tank which holds disinfectant solution
This arrangement is designed with diameter of
2.5 meters and 3 meters in height with storage
capacity of 14,500 liters (approximately).
Outlet of this water container is connected to a
very low powered water pump which
pressurizes the water and sprays throw sprayer
for efficient water consumption. This is
followed by a sponge which touches the
ground and removes the excess water in places
of wetlands or in rainy seasons.
C. Motors used
C.1 Two motors of 1 hp is used to run the
elevated conveyor belt. These motors are
placed under the garbage containers. Drive
shaft of these motors are extended more than
normal so that a belt that runs the outer
rotating bristles is connected along this.
C.2 A motor is fixed under the compartment to
spray the water along the tracks. This is
optional since the disinfection differs from
place to place depending on the surroundings.
V. Conclusion and future
works
This prototype suits almost all climatic
conditions. It can be attached to an existing
compartment of a train or to a separate engine.
This compartment can be made standalone and
can be engineered with extremely low cost
communication techniques to work without
any external engine.
VI. Reference
[1] www.nr.indianrailways.gov.in
[2] www.rcf.indianrailways.gov.in
[3] www.indianrailways.gov.in
[4] These are the questions asked to the people
and the pie chart describes the responses made
by people. (google forms)
www.goo.gl/forms/kNmjOEF0Wh
[5] Images used are a patent published by Mr.
Perry S. Bagley of United States on Tool
System with Replaceable Heads and Offset
Handle US 20110113577A1 [For
Representative purpose only]
http://www.google.co.in/patents/US20110113
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