Wireless sensor system eases structural monitoring
A
Newtrax Technologies product story
Edited by the Engineeringtalk editorial team
Dec 19, 2007
The Quebec Ministry of Transport came to Newtrax Technologies to improve one of its data acquisition systems.
Faced with a significant increase in the number of structures, including major bridges, in need of instrumentation for structural analysis, the Quebec Ministry of Transport (MTQ) came to Newtrax Technologies to improve one of its data acquisition systems.
The current data acquisition equipment was based on highly sensitive analogue seismic sensors wired with hundreds of meters of cabling.
The time involved transporting, setting up, and then repacking these cables at every test site was a serious burden and generated a significant workload.
These issues had to be resolved to meet the increased demand within a reasonable timeframe.
Newtrax took the seismic sensors currently used by the MTQ and integrated them into a completely self-contained battery-powered wireless solution which is more secure and significantly easier and quicker to deploy and subsequently take down at the completion of testing.
"Handling, installing and repacking the sensors used to take as much as a full day of work when we were working with the cables".
"This is significant considering we usually only spend two or three days in the field at each structure".
"Newtrax's wireless system eliminates that delay and more inspections can be completed using the same resources", said Jean-Francois Laflamme, Instrumentation Engineer from the Structures Directorate, the MTQ's structural analysis expert unit.
In addition to the optimisation of time MTQ engineers spend in the field, the wireless solution enables data acquisition on larger structures such as the Pierre-Laporte Bridge in Quebec City, the longest main span suspension bridge in Canada.
According to Laflamme, the instrumentation of a structure longer than 1km would not have been possible with the existing wired system.
The new wireless system will allow the MTQ to complete these tests with easier handling and deployment of the sensors and without having to worry about the signal noise cables pick up over such long distances.
Newtrax's wireless mesh products are designed for harsh environments without access to grid power outlets.
Newtrax's wireless mesh protocol supports networks with numerous hops between the gateway and leaf nodes.
Some client installations currently operate with as many as 30 hops between the gateway and the furthest node.
No central network co-ordinator is required for the network to form by itself.
Data acquired at high frequency by the numerous seismic sensors must be synchronised with very high precision for correct analysis.
Newtrax's wireless mesh protocol delivers accurate time synchronisation between all devices.
The wireless devices can easily interface with standard sensors, including the seismic sensors used by the MTQ.
System output is unchanged so engineers use the same data analysis software.
Engineers use an intuitive graphical interface to quickly and easily configure all sensor parameters and trigger data acquisition sessions.
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