Patent ID: 7755660

Claim:
A video inspection system mountable on a railcar or a vehicle adapted to travel on a railroad track, said railroad track including individual rails, said video inspection system being adapted to facilitate inspection of predetermined rail components while traveling on the railroad track, said video inspection system comprising: a light source adapted to provide illumination to at least one rail of the railroad track to illuminate visible surfaces of the predetermined rail components on upper and/or side surfaces of the rail; a sensor adapted to provide an output signal upon detection of the predetermined rail components indicative of the presence of the predetermined rail components; a camera adapted to provide an image of each predetermined rail component detected by said sensor; a trigger generator adapted to convert said output signal from said sensor to a trigger signal, wherein the trigger generator is activated upon detection of each predetermined rail component; and a computing device adapted to capture and store said image of each predetermined rail component provided by said camera and to compare each predetermined rail component to a pattern indicative of damage or a defect in each predetermined rail component.