Estimating Vertical Profile Irregularities From Vehicle Dynamics Measurements

Track geometry is an important parameter, used by railways, for routine track maintenance. Laser based Track Recording Coaches (LTRCs) are widely availed by railways, for recording track geometry defects, such as: vertical profile, alignment, gauge etc. In this paper, a novel method for monitoring vertical profile irregularities by in-service rail vehicle dynamics measurements has been proposed. The procedure takes as input, data from bogie installed inertial measurement unit (IMU) measuring vertical acceleration and pitch-rate, and encoder measuring longitudinal velocity. Extended Kalman Filter (EKF) with Rauch-Tung-Striebel (RTS) smoothing and Extended Kalman Particle Filter (EPF) are reviewed, for detecting vertical profile irregularities. Process model of nonlinear state estimation filters, EKF and EPF, has been developed by applying a novel analytical technique that approximates osculating circle of a point on the vertical profile curve. Further, measurement model has been devised by a novel procedure estimating curvatures from circles approximating trajectory sensed by vertical acceleration and pitch-rate curvature. Proposed method has been field-tested by comparing its output with LTRC's recorded data.