Description

The Automated System includes several subsystems detailed as follows:
 

• Weather Station. Meassuring system for both the climatic variables and the state of the road. In the basic configuration an intelligent sensor is included with the capability to measure surface temperature, amount of melting product dissolved, height of the film of water and possibility to distinguish its state: liquid, snow, ice.

• Control Unit. Is the nerve centre of the system. At this point the measuring and control busses come together in order to decide how to function depending both on the meteorological parameters and the state of the road. Also remote connections via MODEM, optical fibre, etc., are done to communicate with the corresponding Road Maintenance Centre.

• Hydraulic Circuit. The distribution of the liquid for ice melting and its sprinkling is done through a double hydraulic closed ring (one for the liquid for melting ice and another for the cleaning water) in which are also included, apart from the storing unit and the pumping unit, several devices to control and confirm the sprinkling.

In the hydraulic circuit there is an element which is worth noting, the sprinkle, a very versatile component because it can be dismounted after having been installed in the road, it is orientable and can be adjusted to different patterns of sprinkling (up to 16 streams can be selected and the available width reaches up to 360º)