Railinc has announced that the development of the Comprehensive Equipment Performance Monitoring (CEPM) program’s next phase—CEPM-Side Frames, Bolsters and Couplers—is underway and on track. This phase of the program is intended to give rail industry participants visibility into the health status and history of side frames, bolsters and couplers, helping them to improve rail safety and the recall process.
“The freight rail industry sees great value in being able to have electronic visibility and management of rail equipment components,” says Allen West, Railinc CEO and president. “We are excited to start the development of the next phase of a transformative program that will help deliver these capabilities and that will have a lasting impact on the industry.”
The CEPM program is a multi-phase, multi-year initiative to create an industry process and related technology tools for capturing data around railcar equipment components. For more information about the CEPM program, please visit the program resource site.
The AAR’s Equipment Health Monitoring Committee and the Coupling System and Truck Castings Committee are guiding the development of requirements around CEPM-Side Frames, Bolsters and Couplers. Railinc will provide updates on CEPM-Side Frames, Bolsters and Couplers to the industry throughout 2012.
Beginning June 28, users will be able to register side frames and bolsters through critical Railinc data systems that serve the North American freight rail industry. The ability to associate side frames and bolsters will become available in August, and rail industry participants can register and associate couplers beginning in December.
As part of the CEPM program, Railinc has developed a reusable component framework and central repository that supports the registration and association of a multitude of components in a single component registry. Railinc will make updates to this component framework in 2012 to enable additional access and productivity tools.