OCR in freight terminals.

An American global port operator deployed Moxa PoE+ (Power over Ethernet) switches to provide highly reliable data transmissions for their crane optical character recognition (OCR) system. The OCR system tracks the loading and unloading of freight containers at port terminals, and may help in lessoning the severe supply chain issues currently impacting the global economy.

As the key to automating the cargo handling process, the OCR system improves the efficiency of moving containers from ship to shore and reduces occupational hazards for personnel. In order to realize these benefits, the port system integrator had to overcome critical challenges to building a reliable crane OCR system. These challenges included deploying wiring in an environment with many obstacles, providing power supply for a variety of high-resolution outdoor cameras, ensuring reliable data transmissions, and reducing maintenance efforts.

To automate the container checking process, the crane OCR system is equipped with multiple cameras to capture images of all passing containers, including each container’s serial number, from different angles. Some of these cameras are high-resolution PTZ (Pan Tilt Zoom) cameras that have above-standard requirements, such as input of 60W per port. Moxa provided a complete portfolio of switches to satisfy all camera requirements. 

Solutions included the EDS-P506E-4PoE managed switch, which provides high power output of up to 60W per port. Where the demand for power was not high, other cost-efficient options such as the Moxa EDS-P510A-8PoE managed switch, was installed. The managed switches provide high MTBF and protect against extreme environments where outdoor crane systems are often used. Moreover, Moxa PoE managed switches include a built-in “Smart PoE” feature to support remote powered device (PD) management, including PD status monitoring, remote PoE port power cycling, and PoE port power cycle scheduling. These switches not only satisfy all of the system requirements, but also enable smooth operation and reduce overall maintenance costs.

Moreover, reliable data transmission is necessary for sending real-time images back to the port terminal’s remote control center for further identification and analysis. Moxa’s redundancy technologies, Turbo Ring and Turbo Chain, are specially designed to protect networks against transmission failures. Turbo Ring and Turbo Chain both support millisecond-level fast recovery to ensure that there are no interruptions to image data transmissions.

In certain situations redundancy technologies alone may not suffice, for example, a device could malfunction or lose cable communications. By using Moxa MXview or MXview ToGo graphical network management software, system administrators can remotely visualize the crane OCR system network to gain immediate insights and take the necessary steps to resolve network problems.

@MoxaInc @OConnell_PR #PAuto #Transport