Self-Operated Car Washing System Using Programmable Logic Controllers

In locomotive garages, cleaning of cars is primarily done by hand, which results in the wastage of water, use of man power and wastage of time. To address this challenge, the paper presents the concept of automated car washing system along with its real time implementation using programmable logic controllers (PLC). The automated car wash system involves the simultaneous steps like foaming, cleaning, washing, and drying. The application of PLC guarantees the incorporation of enhanced cleaning standards along with the minimization of wiring or rewiring aspects. The proposed PLC based car washing system integrates sensors and various cleaning mechanisms to enhance cleaning efficiency and simulations reduction in time. The validation of the proposed automated cleaning system is realized by the hardware implementation at the prototype level where various cleaning stages have been validated and demonstrated successfully.