An on-board braking monitoring system for intermodal freight trains

This paper describes the design and testing of an On-Board Unit monitoring system for intermodal freight wagons realized by the research group of Railway Engineering of Politecnico di Torino. The prototype of the On Board Unit was then installed and tested on a vehicle owned by Ambrogio Trasporti S.p.a. within the project ITS Cluster Italy 2020 funded by the MIUR. The developed prototype was tested within the project on the line that connect Turin (IT) to Mouguerre (FR) along the Railway of Frejus and its gallery. Vehicle parameters monitored during the tests were: the temperature of brake blocks, the operating pressures of the brake system and the vehicle accelerations. The measures carried out have allowed to verify, in the first place, the effectiveness of the monitoring system in line and to collect a significant amount of useful data for subsequently developing monitoring and diagnostic vehicle’s algorithms.