Installation, measurements and modelling of Nieporet bridge in Poland
As a part of the development of an accurate and cost-effective method of weighing trains in motion for the project partner, Adaptronica from Poland, a typical steel truss bridge was instrumented.
Initially, a 3-dimensional finite element model was developed that served as a resource for designing the measurement setup.
Field testing with the SiWIM® hardware and software was performed on the Nieporęt railway bridge between 20th and 25th of May, 2013. Forty five trains were captured, of which four were the calibration trains that were also weighed using a low-speed weigh station near Warsaw. The reference weights of all four trains were provided by Adaptronica after the field testing was complete.
First results are very promising. The figure below shows an excellent match between the measured and the calculated signals, which for the case of constant train velocity, resulted in errors of gross weights of individual carriages of less than 2.6%. In the second year of the project, work will focus on improvements and new algorithms to increase accuracy of results even further.
