An investigation on the influence of pantograph friction on its interaction with a catenary using co-simulations

The paper discusses an important phenomenon in a railway pantograph mechanism, i.e. contribution of friction in its overall performance. A pantograph must fulfill many conditions to be allowed for operation, one of them is that friction force has to be kept within the specific tolerances. There is yet another requirement to improve contact quality between pantograph contact strip and catenary. To improve the quality of contact it is desirable to reduce the values of standard deviation and peak-to-peak value of the contact force. The paper presents the results of numerical investigation on the influence of pantograph on its interaction with a catenary. The analysis was carried out employing the multi-domain co-simulation approach previously developed by the authors. The results are presented for various run speeds. The study has proven the existence of a significant impact of the friction phenomenon on the pantograph interaction with overhead contact lines.