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Project information

Computation of the wear of the overhead system of high speed railways

L. Rouco A. Carnicero O. López-García E. Pilo

December 2004 - December 2007

Funding entity Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia


The high speed European railroad raise involves a technical challenge in the development of the railway systems which must fulfill more demanding requirements. The overhead system wear is governed by two main contributions: friction, which is determined by the contact forces, and the electric arcs that appear in the contact losses. Considering the importance of overhead system wear in the maintenance planning, and the increase of the number of high speed trains lines in Spain in the following years, the development of numerical tools to take into account maintenance criteria in the catenary design is extremely useful. The goal of the project is to develop the aforementioned tool which is an innovation in the current catenary pattern design.


MEC-Desgaste