Passengers travelling in Polish intercity trains (PKP Intercity) from East to West and from North to South (i.e. Warsaw, Gdańsk, Berlin) now can enjoy passenger WiFi. It is free of charge for the passengers, they simply need to register. To realize this, the manufacturer of trains FPS Cegielski (H. Cegielski – Fabryka Pojazdów Szynowych Sp. z.o.o.) has integrated a total of 60 pieces of NB3800 railway routers from March 2018 until March 2019, with an option of additional 30 devices until September 2019. These NB3800 wireless railway routers realize fast internet connection with Quad LTE. The system integrator Ledatel, a leading Polish company in the rail telecommunications systems business, has played a decisive role during the integration uf the routers. Ledatel has chosen NetModule routers due to their ability to integrate 4 modems working in parallel as well as a GPS server. Additionally, the EN50155 and EN45545 certification and the possibility of a central management as well as remote maintenance and monitoring via data center has been beneficial. To enable passenger WiFi in the train, each wagon has been equipped with an own router. The quad SIM feature and the sophisticated WAN link manager are providing load balancing between multiple network providers to achieve maximum connection availability. The extraordinary performance of the NB3800 railway routers which enable applications needing high data throughput is another special feature of the systems.
In addition to passenger WiFi and entertainment the NB3800 railway routers can also be used for applications like condition monitoring. Latest VPN technologies like OpenVPN or IPSec ensure secure data transmission. The router can also serve as a GSM-VoIP gateway, i.e. for communication of the conductor to the control center, emergency calls or site-independent calls of conductors to the center and vice versa for direct announcements into the train. Thanks to the integrated GPS module and the transmittal of railway data, the center can locate the train with pinpoint accuracy, analyze operational data and react immediately if needed.