Experimental analysis of effect of plain carbon and impregnated carbon contact strips on contact wire wear

The typical material of contact strips for current collection in a.c., as for High-Speed operation, is the plain carbon or the impregnated carbon with different percentage of metal impregnation. The correct choice of contact strip material influences the wear rate of contact wire and also contact strip. Reduction on wear for contact strips but especially for contact wire involves reduction on maintenance costs. To this aim, laboratory tests were performed by means of the test bench for current collection of Politecnico di Milano, in order to obtain a comparison between the effect of plain carbon and impregnated carbon contact strips on the contact wire wear. In the present paper first the test bench for current collection is presented and the main results are shown and discussed.