Automatic Equipment Identification, or AEI, is technology that uses electronically coded tags to identify railcars, locomotives, inter-modal vehicles, and end of train devices. These tags are always placed on both sides of railcars and locomotives and are encoded with the owner’s code and car number, length, equipment group code, tag type, car/locomotive number, side indicator code (A or B), number of axles, bearing type code and platform identifier code (rail car tag). Optionally, tags are sometimes placed on shipping containers that ride atop railcars. A track-side radio frequency (RF) module transmits an unmodulated signal to each tag passing by, and each tag reflects a modulated signal back (back-scatter). The RF module transfers the back-scatter information to the sites computer(s) to decode the information from each tag.

So, in short, as trains move by, complete "standing order consists" are constructed by AEI sites, without error or duplication and at high speeds, and then those consists are transmitted to one or more central computer systems for further processing. The purpose of AEI tagging is for customers to be able to know the location of rolling stock on their railroads. Over 3000 AEI reader sites are in service today, and more are added all the time. AEI sites must send their data to some central computer, and that computer is referred to as an AEI Front End Processor (FEP). FEPs are the first point of contact for AEI data coming from sites in the field, and they are responsible for reliably receiving data from the AEI sites and passing it along to other computer systems that are users and processors of the data.

Historically, railroads have been forced to build and maintain complex computing and communication infrastructures and operate their own AEI FEP systems to receive data from AEI sites. 10East offers the RailDOCS AEI Front End Processor to customers as a pay-as-you go service. Customer AEI sites send their data to 10East’s data center, where RailDOCS displays and/or dispatches the information to an unlimited number of designates as desired by each customers. And with dispatch rules that can be as fine grained as to apply only to a single route on a single AEI site, or be as broad as a customer’s entire fleet of sites (even spanning multiple railroads), RailDOCS's AEI dispatching options can meet any need.

In addition to train consist reporting, the RailDOCS AEI Front End Processor also applies sophisticated diagnostic logic to each AEI message received, and provides unmatched metrics for automated monitoring of AEI site health, with instant dispatching of alert messages. RailDOCS provides the most feature-rich and turnkey AEI service available, and provides functionality that has never been commercially available before now, and to any size rail carrier. RailDOCS AEI will save on both capital investments and operating expenses, and enable you to take full advantage of the investment in your AEI infrastructure, and at a cost that is within the reach of any size carrier.