China has introduced its first intelligent inspection robots for freight trains at Huanghua Port in north China’s Hebei Province. Capable of inspecting up to 10 trains a day, these robots are revolutionizing railway maintenance and boosting efficiency.
Wang Peng, deputy general manager of the Suning maintenance branch at China Energy Railway Equipment Co., Ltd., announced that the robots have achieved a 100% recognition rate for common train faults. “The robot set—one inspecting the train’s underside and two checking its sides—can inspect 54 carriages in 135 minutes,” Wang said.
Since their debut on May 11, the robots have been operating in the train maintenance depot of Huanghua. The number of side-inspecting robots is expected to increase to 10 within four months. “By then, tasks that previously required 16 people and over 50 minutes will be completed by robots in just 27 minutes,” Wang added.
Zhang Hao, a dispatcher overseeing the robotic operations, explained that the intelligent robots photograph key areas while inspecting a 648-meter-long freight train with 54 carriages to collect fault data. “The 15-centimeter-thick robot can finish a round trip of checking the train bottom in less than three minutes, capturing all suspected fault points before returning to charge and await the next command,” Zhang said.
The side-inspecting robots, equipped with mechanical arms featuring vertical, horizontal, and rotational movements, take approximately 2.5 minutes to scan a single train carriage. Together, the three robots capture 9,450 high-definition images during each inspection. The intelligent system promptly analyzes the data, indicating the location and over 120 types of suspected faults.
“Robots indeed work with higher precision than humans,” acknowledged Lyu Dawei, a veteran maintenance worker. The adoption of these robots marks a significant step forward in China’s efforts to modernize its railway infrastructure.
