A TCP/IP-based remote control system for yard cranes in a port container terminal

If one operator in a remote operating room can operate 4 ∼ 5 cranes remotely, which are yard cranes for container loading/unloading in a port container terminal, the port loading/unloading efficiency will dramatically be improved through productivity increase, cost reduction, and so on. This study presents a remote crane control system for container loading/unloading yard cranes of port container terminals. First, a wireless web-based video and audio transmission system to transmit the images and the sounds of a craneyard is designed by using 3 web cameras and a microphone. Next, a TCP/IP-based remote crane control system is presented on the basis of the delay performance simulations of TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) and UDP (User Datagram Protocol) for real-time remote control. The simulation results show that TCP is more advantageous for remote crane control on a local network.