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Main contributions to the wear in the sliding contact between pantograph's strip and catenary's wire can be classified as: i) mechanical contribution, due to friction, ii) electrical contribution, due to current flow at the contact and iii) electrical arcs contribution related to power dissipated during arc generation. In this work, a heuristic wear model for the contact wire, which accounts for the mentioned three main contributions to the wear, is presented. After a tuning phase with results obtained by an experimental campaign aimed at evaluating the wear for the couple "pure copper contact wire -Kasperovski contact strip", the wear model is used in combination with a dynamical electromechanical model able to reproduce the electromechanical pantograph-catenary interaction.Suggested Reviewers: Takayuki Usuda Railway Technical Research Institute usuda@rtri.or.jp Dr Usuda is senior researcher on the interaction between pantograph and catenary and on related problems.Rafael Manory M&H Materials Pty Ltd rmanory@kuee.kyoto-u.ac.jp Dr Manory studies problems related to the interaction between pantograph and catenary, to the sliding wear, to the electromechanical contacts and to the wear tests for copper and graphite materials.Guangxiong Chen Southwest Jiaotong University, State Key Laboratory of Traction Power, Chengdu, China chen_guangx@163.com Author of different works on electromechanical problems related to pantograph-catenary interaction.Dear Tribology International Editors, we would like to submit the present paper titled " Electromechanical interaction between carbon based pantograph strip and copper contact wire: a heuristic wear model" for a possible publication on your review.The paper deals with a heuristic wear model, tuned using results obtained by a laboratory campaign on the couple "pure copper contact wire -Kasperovski contact strip", which is used in combination with a dynamical electromechanical model able to reproduce the electromechanical pantographcatenary interaction. This procedure try to reproduce the real conditions that cause the wire's wear evolution.The practical application of the presented procedure can be useful to estimate the maintenance costs related to the wear of contact wire and to assess the effective benefit of proposed innovative solutions for pantographs and catenaries.Best Regards, Giuseppe Bucca, Andrea Collina giuseppe.bucca@polimi.it Cover Letter I confirm that this paper is original and it has not been published previously and it is not under consideration elsewhere.Giuseppe Bucca, on behalf of all authors *Statement of OriginalityMain contributions to the wear in the sliding contact between pantograph's strip and catenary's wire can be classified as: i) mechanical contribution, due to friction, ii) electrical contribution, due to current flow at the contact and iii) electrical arcs contribution related to power dissipated during arc generation. In this work, a heuristic wear model for the contact wire, which accounts for the three main contributions to the wea...

Optical fiber sensors are proposed to detect static and dynamic collector strain for high-speed railway pantograph achieving electromagnetic immunity, nonelectrically conducting and small size. The implemented scheme based on a Michelson’s interferometer with a 3x3 coupler allows local strain measurement insensitive to temperature variations with high reliability guaranteed by the employment of standard 1550 nm optical communications components. By a test rig to experimentally simulate the pantograph-catenary contact-force the sensor performance is compared with typical electric measurement

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The dynamic interaction between a pantograph and a catenary influences the quality of the current collection; in particular, when two pantographs are used to collect current, the second pantograph is subjected to the disturbances originated on the overhead line by the transit of the first pantograph, generally causing a deterioration of current collection quality. Under these conditions, the occurrence of continuous sparking, contact loss, and arcing cause an increase of wear for both contact wire and collector strips, but also cause variations of contact voltage and feed current that in turn produce interferences on the on-board electrical systems like drive motors and signalling system. In order to investigate the latter, a procedure for the correlation of the quality of current collection with the level of electrical interference is proposed in this article. The procedure is based on experimental and numerical models combining relationships obtained by means of laboratory tests with simulation tools. An application to a real case of double pantograph collection is presented.