Rail Vehicle's Suspension Monitoring System - Analysis of Results Obtained in Tests of the Prototype

Abstract

The active safety issue of rail vehicles is important for providing regular transportation services and minimizing the risk of accidents. One of the solutions to the problem of assuring high level of active safety is applying the condition monitoring of suspension system. Suspension, as a part of running gear, is crucial for providing proper running behavior stability. The increasing demands on improving safety of railway transport has led to development of prototype of rail vehicles' suspension monitoring system at Monitoring of Technical State of Construction and Evaluation of its Lifespan Project (MONIT). The idea of the system is qualitative assessment of suspension condition based on acceleration signals measured on bogie frames, wheels and body. The monitoring system prototype has been tested on passenger and freight cars in two states of suspension condition: nominal and damaged. Experimental tests have been performed on experimental track near Zmigrod in Poland. This paper presents analysis of the results obtained from the tests of the rail vehicles' suspension monitoring system prototype.