Assessment of Current Collection Performance of Rail Pantograph-Catenary Considering Long Suspension Bridges

To meet the demands of transport development in mountainous regions, extensive efforts have been devoted to the ongoing construction of long suspension railway bridges. In the context of electrified railways, the crucial responsibility of transferring electric current to the train falls upon the pantograph-catenary system. The installation of the railway catenary on the suspension bridge deck intertwines the dynamics of suspension bridges with trains, thereby directly influencing the dynamic performance of the pantograph-catenary system and potentially degrading the current collection quality. An imperative aspect of ensuring operational safety is the thorough evaluation of the impact of train-bridge interaction on the pantograph-catenary interaction performance. Consequently, this article establishes comprehensive models for both the train-rail-bridge and pantograph-catenary dynamics. In order to capture the complete essence of the interaction, the excitation from bridge vibrations is seamlessly integrated into the pantograph-catenary simulation, resulting in a unified train-rail-bridge-pantograph-catenary (TRBPC) coupled dynamics model. Spectral analysis is employed to identify the primary factors contributing to the deterioration of current collection quality. The findings reveal that the vibrations of the vehicle exert a more substantial influence on pantograph-catenary interaction in comparison to bridge vibrations. Furthermore, it is observed that the effects of train-bridge interaction on the dynamic performance of the pantograph-catenary system intensify with speed upgrades. Notably, rail irregularities emerge as a significant factor degrading the current collection quality, which contributes more significantly to contact force fluctuations at low speeds.