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AN ACTIVE PNEUMATIC TILTING SYSTEM FOR RAILWAY CARS

1992; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 20; Issue: sup1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/00423119208969402

1744-5159

Hiroshi Higaki, Soji FUJIMORI, Y. Horike, T. Yasui, S Koyanagi, Isao Okamoto, Koichi Terada,

Railway Systems and Energy Efficiency

SUMMARY The demand for high-speed railway cars has recently been increasing in order to shorten travel time. The narrow gauge railway lines in Japan have so many short-radius curves due to their passage through mountainous areas, and trains running at higher than specified speeds suffer from such problems as unbalanced centrifugal acceleration, which spoils ride quality and affects safety. Series 381 electric railway cars with a roller-type passive-pendulum system, which were designed to solve these problems, reduce stationary lateral acceleration, but do not provide satisfactory ride quality at the entrance to and exit from curves. Because of this problem, these passive-pendulum cars do not satisfy the recent demand for high-speed railway cars. In order to meet the need for high-speed railway cars that also provide satisfactory ride quality, an active pneumatic tilting system that is microcomputer controlled, has been developed and put into service. In field tests, this system was installed on Series 381 railway cars. It controls body tilting with a roller-type passive-pendulum mechanism and air cylinders which smooth the car body rolling motion. The computer-control system detects the location of curves and optimizes the tilting based upon the curve and speed so as to maintain ride quality. This tilting system makes it possible to increase the speeds of Shikoku Railway Company Series 2000 cars by 20 to 30 km/h compared to regular cars.