Effect Evaluation of Lightning Protection Measures on Train Detectors for Level Crossing System

Abstract

Effective and economical lightning protection measures are necessary for the railway signalling systems because suspended operation or train delays due to lightning damage may cause social disturbance. This paper introduces a calculation model for lightning overvoltages on railway level crossing equipment. The calculation model consists of a propagation model of lightning surge along the rails and an equivalent circuit model of equipment. The calculation model was confirmed the validity by comparison with field test results. This model is applicable for quantitative estimation of lightning protection measures of railway signalling equipment. This paper also describes the measurement results the correlation between lightning overvoltages on the components of railway signalling equipment and lightning conditions, such as the stroke current and the strike position. Moreover, this paper indicates the evaluated effect on decreasing lightning hazards for railway signalling systems in the case of adoption of the proposal lightning protection measures.