Design and Development of Rail Monitoring System for 1:3 Laboratory Train Using Fiber Bragg Grating Sensors

Development of railway networks depends on continuous structural and operation monitoring of train and its parts in real time. This paper describes the condition monitoring of train wheels and rail by using fiber optic sensors. A new 1:3 downscale test train is developed to study the rail-wheel interactions. Two laboratory experiments were carried out in the test train using fiber Bragg grating as strain sensors. First is the wagon load analysis, followed by flat wheel detection. A good agreement of results is observed with sensitivity of sensor 1.31pm /µε and reflectivity of 89.51%. By applying proper filtering techniques, we can observe the high frequency dynamic vibrations in the rail wheel system.