SMRT Trains LTD are the first ones doing this in
Asia Pacific Region. Applying Industrial Internet
of Things for Rail Transport Engineering lever-
aging on MS Azure Cloud Data Services and Big
Data Analytics to effect condition-based mainte-
nance to bring forth unprecedented Rail Reli-
ability performance. It affords us to intervene
at the opportune time during engineering hours
as opposed to revenue hours and do corrective
maintenance as opposed to breakdown mainte-
nance that results into train service delays and
disruptions. Such is the power of the so called
“Internet of Things”.
I design and build IIoT systems that promote
Rail Reliability for my company SMRT Trains
LTD. This most so often involves a lot of reverse
engineering of sub-systems applying techniques
such as FMECA – Failure Modes Analysis Effects
and Criticality Analysis, alongside of which one
applies RCM – Reliability Centered Maintenance,
HFA – Human Factor Awareness and lastly ap-
ply the principles of Lean Six Sigma for Visual
Management. IIoT very much can find its way to
the different sub-systems in rail, among them
is applying this for use in predicting failure for
our Half Height Platform Screen Doors. These
doors are an instrument of safety for the pas-
SBS Downtown Line Train stabled at Kim Chuan
senger riding public and is a bane for the rail
Depot Singapore. Biggest underground train depot
operator simply because of the design maxim
that has been employed to the train system and
that is, “Doors need to be proven closed for
the train to move forward”. Any delay above 5
minutes is considered a “Train Service Disrup-
recognition, pattern recognition, machine learn-
tion” and a hefty fine is imposed for not being
ing, artificial intelligence to be able to predict
able to adhere to our Service Level Agreements
impending sub-systems failure in an automated
of attaining 1,000,000 Mean (Train) Kilometer
manner by which alerts and prompts are sent
Between Failure targets within a month with a
via SMS and emails to the concerned work party
90 seconds headway for the succeeding train to that handles maintenance and then take imme-
approach the platform.
diate action.
Such a tall order that only such kinds of tech-
This is only but scratching the surface where
nologies such as the “Internet of Things” and
“Internet of Things” can be applied to promote
Big Data Analytics can surmount this problem as efficiency and organizational excellence in op-
a forward looking practical solution as we strive erations wellness.
for “Digital Trains” having one source of “Truth” DBTC Mandaluyong through the efforts of
and as Singapore thrusts itself to become a
our DBMAII will be the hotbed of “Internet of
smart nation. The power of the internet is such
Things” technology and emblazon the path in
that MS Azure Cloud Services and the like, (AWS, industry where the Bosconians lead the way in
Google, IBM Bluemix, Alibaba Cloud) can pro-
this field.
vide the necessary tools to do data crunching
in an almost real-time fashion to do anomaly
17