Objective
SAFT Inspect is an ultrasonic inspection solution for railway crossing points. Our technology facilitates for the first time full volume inspection of railway crossings. Rail crossing, known as “frogs” are mechanical installations that enable a train to switch from one track to another. Frogs are subjected to repetitive impact from the rolling stock, causing fatigue cracking. For this reason, frogs are manufactured from manganese steel with work-hardening properties to be highly resistance to fatigue cracking. Unfortunately, this hardening property makes frogs extremely challenging to inspect. The huge problem is, once frogs are broken, causes train derailment.
Current inspection techniques are limited to visual inspection, only inspecting frog surface, which is extremely risky. If a crack has not yet propagated trough the surface, will go undetected. However, when a crack has reached the surface, it needs to be immediately replaced. Unscheduled maintenance of frogs can lead to multiple train delays blocking the entire railway for more than 6 hours causing heavy losses of €288,000 in penalties per day. Full volumetric inspection is essential as can be used to detect a crack before it has reached the surface to plan maintenance in advance. Ultrasonic inspection raises a candidate solution for full volume inspection due to ultrasound penetration. This technique is well established for rail track inspection, however when applied to frogs becomes ineffective. Manganese grain structure is very course. This makes the material highly attenuative to ultrasound resulting in poor penetration depth and low signal to noise ratio (SNR). We have overcome these technical barriers by applying an ultrasonic Inspection technique called Synthetic Aperture Focusing Technique (SAFT) combined with advanced processing algorithms to offer an ultrasonic inspection technique with enhanced SNR. This is the first time that this technique is applied for Non Destructing Testing applications.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eu-vocabularies/euroscivoc.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eu-vocabularies/euroscivoc.
- natural sciences chemical sciences inorganic chemistry transition metals
- engineering and technology electrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineering electronic engineering signal processing
- social sciences economics and business business and management business models
- engineering and technology civil engineering transportation engineering railroad engineering
- natural sciences physical sciences acoustics ultrasound
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Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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H2020-EU.3.4. - SOCIETAL CHALLENGES - Smart, Green And Integrated Transport
MAIN PROGRAMME
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H2020-EU.2.3.1. - Mainstreaming SME support, especially through a dedicated instrument
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Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
SME-1 - SME instrument phase 1
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) H2020-SMEInst-2014-2015
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
28023 MADRID
Spain
The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.