Design of a Modular and Integrated On-Board System for Freight Train Condition Monitoring

Condition monitoring is becoming an essential tool in the railway industry, allowing to increase the efficiency in vehicles maintenance interventions.This is particularly critical in the case of freight trains, since the majority of wagons is still non sensorized.The research work aims at developing a monitoring system with two main purposes: to be applicable to different wagon typologies and to be an integrated solution for the monitoring of the different mechanical subsystems of the vehicle.The focus is put on the energy harvesting to suitably power supply the wireless sensor nodes and on the identification of the possible malfunctioning of the braking plant.The design of the monitoring system has been driven by an empirical model of the braking plant realized also to support the analysis of experimental data collected by the monitoring devices in the diagnostic stage.