Emerging Technologies in Tunnel Instrumentation and Monitoring
When it comes to tunnels and underground caverns, geotechnical instrumentation and monitoring play a huge role as it deals with naturally occurring heterogeneous materials. With the emergence of disruptive technology, field instrumentation for safety monitoring has become highly sophisticated and advanced over time.
In this article, we will be talking about the emerging technologies and trends of tunnels instrumentation and monitoring. From cloud-enabled web data monitoring to non-contact methods for monitoring, there is an emergence of modern technology that is increasingly gaining popularity and is more affordable.
We have seen a rise in a reliable sensor network that promotes fast and effective data representation. This becomes even more crucial in high-risk urban tunnelling projects. Moreover, the cost competitiveness of the industry has motivated and promoted the need for more affordable alternatives.
Let’s take a look at the various technologies provided by Encardio-rite for tunnel monitoring, and how they serve the current demand of the industry, along with the emerging trends.
Wired & Wireless Sensor Networks
SD-12 interface real-time monitoring
Real-time monitoring plays an important role in geotechnical instrumentation and monitoring. For accurate and seamless data collection, advanced automatic data loggers have been designed with built-in GSM/GPRS modems. These have an SDI-12 interface and provide wireless transmission to a remote server.
SDI-12, here, refers to the Serial Digital Interface at 1200 bauds, which is an asynchronous serial communication protocol used to connect and communicate with multiple sensors tied in a daisy chain fashion.
The SDI-12 interface is widely popular as it requires only a single 3 conductor cable to interconnect the sensors and the data loggers in a serial bus. When the power is supplied from the SDI-12 instruments through the SDI-12 bus, there is a route for communication on the bidirectional serial data line between SDI-12 sensors and the datalogger. The cables coming from multiple sensors are joined at the multi-position junction, also known as the switch boxes. At the conclusion, the multicore cables are routed to the data acquisition system.
With the SDI-12 monitoring, you save a notable part of the overall cabling cost.
The GSM/GPRS capability of the data loggers allows uploading the recorded data directly to the remote FTP server. You can adjust the device to take a measurement from 5 seconds to 168 hours. Moreover, the data is recorded with the current date, time, and battery voltage.
Communication between the device(PC & Mobile) and the datalogger can either be through a cable or through Bluetooth modem.
Wireless real-time monitoring using RF
The wireless monitoring solution makes use of RF data loggers or nodes that are compatible with a wide array of geotechnical and environmental sensors and RF gateways. Encardio-rite offers an innovative long range radio network solution that allows real-time monitoring of geotechnical and structural sensors in challenging conditions with reliable data transfer without any delay. The data remains accessible to any authorized user across the globe by logging on to the web-based data management software.
In our end-to-end wireless monitoring system, the sensors are interfaced with the long range, low power wireless network through RF nodes that send recorded data to the Gateway with utmost reliability. Gateway uploads the collected sensor data to the central/cloud server.
The long range radio frequency based wireless data collection network provides complete automation of monitoring with seamless connectivity in large construction sites, tunnels and landslide projects. The wireless system eliminates the need for running lengthy cables. It is especially useful at locations where sensors are distributed over wide areas and running cable lengths to long distances can be tricky and/or at locations where construction activity can damage the running sensor cables.
The wireless mesh-based data collection protocol is very useful in tunnels as it provides uninterrupted connectivity. If at any point during the monitoring process the node cannot reach the gateway directly, the information can still be sent via other nodes in the network. This makes it a very reliable option. All the data collected is sent to the gateway, with each gateway handling up to 50 nodes.
Wireless Monitoring using RF nodes provides a cost-benefit while also reducing the time needed for the monitoring work. Moreover, you can access hard to reach locations easily with its remote monitoring techniques.
Web Data Monitoring Service
When it comes to online tunnel monitoring, it is crucial and necessary to have a Data Management Software which can retrieve the data seamlessly from the SDI-12 data logger, RF Gateway or ATS control box. The DMS is either public cloud-based or server-based and then works to archive the data in SQL Database. It then further displays the processed data in graphs, tables, and other formats, allowing the authorized personnel to understand it completely.
The Web Monitoring Software is accessible from any type of device that is supported by a web browser, for example, desktop, tablet, PC, laptop, smartphone, etc …[Continue reading]
