Study of Methods for Charging of Energy Storage Devices of Railway Traction Units

The global demand for environmentally friendly and economical railway transport systems has contributed to the development of transport engineering, which creates hybrid traction units in which the combined use of an internal combustion engine with an energy storage device can achieve reduced fuel consumption and environmental emissions. The most promising for use on traction units are Li-ion batteries, which have the highest specific capacity and allow the accumulation of the required amount of energy in the limited dimensions of the rolling stock. To ensure the normal operation of traction units, it is necessary to implement a system of charging and discharging batteries with the ability to control their parameters, which this paper is devoted to. The main charging methods are: constant current charge, constant voltage charge, constant current and constant voltage charge, pulse current charge, charging by cone characteristic, charging by a composite characteristic of constant current and by a composite conical characteristic. Due to the specifics of the work of the traction unit, the most acceptable for use in the system "energy storage - traction drive" is the method of charging according to the composite characteristics of constant current.