Rail vehicle ride comfort prediction based on bogie acceleration measurements

Ride comfort is one of the most significant dynamic performance characteristics of railway vehicles. It is imperative to monitor and predict the vehicle ride comfort online especially for modern rail vehicles. In this paper, an innovative online rail vehicle ride comfort prediction method is proposed. By using the acceleration measurements from the sensors equipped on the bogies, the dynamical acceleration of the carbody is estimated by using principle component analysis (PCA) and partial least square (PLS) techniques. The ride comfort is further calculated by using the estimated three way acceleration signals. The proposed method is validated by using the professional rail vehicle simulation software, SIMPACK.