Effect of Temperature Change and Contact-wire Wear on Current Collection Performance

Abstract

For electric railways, it is preferable for the tension and height of overhead contact lines to be constant to maintain satisfactory current collection performance. Since overhead contact lines expand and contract according to temperature change, an automatic tension balancer is generally installed at the terminations. However, the tension of overhead contact lines is not always constant because of tension fluctuations in automatic tension balancers and the gradient of the yokes. In addition, contact wire wear causes its mass to decrease. This also affects the contact wire tension and height. The authors performed a theoretical study and a simulation. As the results of them, we clarified the effect of temperature change and contact-wire wear on current collection performance.