Study on the Influencing Factors of Electrical Characteristics of Articulated Split-Zone Insulator Arc

Abstract

The frequent occurrence of the pantograph–catenary (PC) arc seriously threatens the safe and stable operation of electric multiple units (EMUs). In order to investigate the primary factors affecting the electrical characteristics of the PC arc, this paper first reveals the mechanism of arc generation when EMUs leave the split-zone insulator according to the actual mechanical structure of the PC articulated split-zone insulator. Then, based on the Habedank black box arc model, considering the dynamic changes in arc length during the actual operation of EMUs, a numerical simulation model suitable for describing the PC articulated split-zone insulator arc is established. Furthermore, by comparing with existing research results, the effectiveness of the proposed model is verified. Next, a series of simulation experiments were conducted to analyze the influence of different operating parameters of the EMUs on the electrical characteristics of the PC arc. More importantly, the paper proposes using the entropy weight method to calculate the impact strength of different operating parameters of the EMUs on the arc duration time of the contact wire split-zone region. The research results of this paper can provide some technical references for reducing the erosion of the PC contact wire and slide caused by arcs when the EMUs pass through the split-zone insulator.