LIZARD^® technology wins top safety award.

News Release
7/9/2001
Newt International Ltd

Ground-breaking rail inspection technology wins top safety award

In the presence of leading railway figures, Newt International Ltd, a small Portsmouth-based company, made its industry debut on the winner’s podium as it accepted ‘The Sir Robert Horton Prize for Most Significant Contribution to Safety’ at the prestigious National Rail Awards 2001.

Newt International Ltd received industry wide recognition for the development of their unique Lizard^® Pedestrian Field Gradient Inspection System. Based on Electromagnetic Array (EMA) technology, it is, according to the awards judges, much more effective in detecting Gauge Corner Cracking than ultrasonic equipment currently deployed on the national railway network. Railtrack have already called it a ‘world first’ and have bought a number of units. The ultimate goal will be to mount the system on a train to maximise its asset management potential.

Mike Bentley, Managing Director of Newt International, said " We are very pleased that our technology has been awarded recognition for such an important cause and hope that in the interests of public safety, a swift and major transfer from ultrasound to EMA inspection technology will be welcomed by the industry."

The Lizard FGI system commanded the judges’ unanimous support for a technical innovation which they said was particularly important.

Concerns about ultrasound’s limitations led to Railtrack and the DTI contributing significant funding in February 2000 to Newt International’s research and development of a new application of Lizard^® EMA technology specifically for identifying rail defects.

Lizard products have been tested and accredited by the railway industry and are already being widely used to detect defects in wheels, axles, coupling pins and other parts of rolling stock.

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Notes to editors:

1. Technical information on the camera and images are available on the Newt International company website at: http://www.lizard.co.uk.

The clear advantages of the camera are:

• demonstrated higher performance
• not limited by any surface geometry or crack size
• permanent database record for surface condition and quality of inspection, e.g. recording of any lift-off during data capture, as wanted by the Rail Regulator
• commercial benefits derived from earlier maintenance planning
• reduced scope for human error
• no need to clean surface.

2. The application of Newt International's EMA Non Destructive Testing (NDT) technology to track follows its proven use on oil and gas platforms, ships, theme parks, manned space flight and in other industries. Clients include Shell Expro; MoD; British Maritime Technology; China Steel; Martin Marietta for the Man Space Flight Programme; Det Norske Veritas; and Sentosa theme parks in East Asia. The company's key development of EMA technology has provided the ability to generate a real-time three-dimensional image of a defect in an engineering structure. A further development has been the ability to see through coatings such as paint or dirt, producing a visual image.
3. Lizard^® EMA technology was originally introduced to the rail industry as a result of interest shown by Sir Richard Branson for its potential benefit to Virgin Rail’s maintenance work.
4. Lizard^® EMA Crack Detection and Sizing system was granted Millennium Product status by the Design Council at an award ceremony attended by the Prime Minister at the Millennium Dome on 14 December 1999.

For further information contact sales@lizard.co.uk

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