Vibration-Based Symptoms in Condition Monitoring of a Light Rail Vehicle

Abstract

Light rail systems have now their great return in many European cities carrying an increasing number of people every year. This increasing trend requires suitable operation and maintenance standards for both vehicle and track. Furthermore, in order to make a public transport competitive to private transport, its very important to increase safety and ride comfort for passengers. The aim of the presented work was to determine the suitable vibration-based symptoms for the identification of a light rail vehicle technical state, as well as the development of appropriate methodology to use the information contained therein. Both simulation and experimental phase are described. The present analysis is focused mainly on the suspension state monitoring, but some others failures were also considered.