Modul

written examination in German language
Duration: 120 minutes
No tools or reference materials may be used during the exam except calculator and dictionary

• The students understand relations and interdependencies between rail vehicles, infrastructure and operation in a rail system.
• Based on operating requirements and legal framework they derive the requirements concerning a capable infrastructure and suitable concepts of rail vehicles.
• They recognize the impact of alignment, understand the important function of the wheel-rail-contact and estimate the impact of driving dynamics on the operating program.
• They evaluate the impact of operating concepts on safety and capacity of a rail system.
• They know the infrastructure to provide power supply to rail vehicles with different drive systems.
• The students learn the role of rail vehicles and understand their classification. They understand the basic structure und know the functions of the main systems. They understand the overall tasks of vehicle system technology.
• They learn functions and requirements of car bodies and jugde advantages and disadvantages of design principles. They know the functions of the car body’s interfaces.
• They know about the basics of running dynamics and bogies.
• The students learn about advantages and disadvantages of different types of traction drives and judge, which one fits best for each application.
• They understand brakes from a vehicular and an operational point of view. They assess the fitness of different brake systems.
• They know the basic setup of train control management system and understand the most important functions.
• They specify and define suitable vehicle concepts based on requirements for modern rail vehicles.

1. Railway System: railway as system, subsystems and interdependencies, definitions, laws, rules, railway and environment, economic impact
2. Operation: Transportation, public transport, regional transport, long-distance transport, freight service, scheduling
3. Infrastructure: rail facilities, track alignment, railway stations, clearance diagram
4. Wheel-rail-contact: carrying of vehicle mass, adhesion, wheel guidance, current return
5. Vehicle dynamics: tractive and brake effort, driving resistance, inertial force, load cycles
6. Signaling and Control: operating procedure, succession of trains, European Train Control System, blocking period, automatic train control
7. Traction power supply: power supply of rail vehicles, comparison electric traction and diesel traction, dc and ac networks, system pantograph and contact wire, filling stations
8. Vehicle system technology: structure and main systems of rail vehicles
9. Car body: functions, requirements, design principles, crash elements, coupling, doors and windows
10. Bogies: forces, running gears, bogies, Jakobs-bogies, active components, connection to car body, wheel arrangement
11. Drives: priciples, electric drives (main components, asynchronous traction motor, inverter, with DC supply, with AC supply, without line supply, multisystem vehicles, dual mode vehicles, hybrid vehicles), non-electric drives
12. Brakes: basics, principles (wheel brakes, rail brakes, blending), brake control (requirements and operation modes, pneumatic brake, electropneumatic brake, emergency brake, parking brake)
13. Train control management system: definition of TCMS, bus systems, components, network architectures, examples, future trends
14. Vehicle concepts: trams, metros, regional trains, intercity trains, high speed trains, double deck vehicles, locomotives, freight wagons

1. Regular attendance: 42 hours
2. Self-study: 42 hours
3. Exam and preparation: 186 hours

Lectures