Ie1iect.Ion of Low Current Short Grc.Uits
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L'EJC-5®E R--jl E IR- Sli RESE E Lr®IPjVE Ie1iect.ion of Low Current Short Grc.uits CP NATIONAL RESEARCCOUNCIL TRANSPORTATION RESEARCH BOARD EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE 1984 Officers Chairman JOSEPH M. CLAPP, Senior Vice President. Roadway Express. Inc Vice Chairman JOHN A. CLEMENTS. Commwioner, New Hampshire Department of Public Works and Highways Secretary - THOMAS B. DEEN, Executive Director. Transportation Research Board Members RAY A. BARNHART, Federal Highway Administrator. (1.5 Department of Transportation (cx officio) Past Chairman. 1983) LAWRENCE D. DAHMS. Executive Director. Metropolitan Transportation Commission. Berkeley. California (cx officio, MICHAEL J. FENELLO. Acting Federal Aviation Administrator, U.S. Department of Transportation (cx officio) FRANCIS B. FRANCOIS, Executive Director. American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (cx officio) WILLIAM I. HARRIS, JR., Vice President for Research and Test Department, Association of American Railroads (cx officio) DARRELL V MANNING, Director, Idaho Transportation Department (cx officio, Past Chairman 1982) RALPH STANLEY, Urban Mass Transportation Administrator. U.S. Department of Transportation (cx officio) DIANE STEED, National Highway Traffic Safety Administrator. US Department of Transportation (cx officio) DUANE BERENTSON, Secretary. Washington State Department of Transportation JOHN R. BORCHERT, Regents Professor. Department of Geography. University of Minnesota LOWELL K. BRIDWELL, Secretary. Maryland Department of Transportation ERNEST E. DEAN, Executive Director. Dallas/Fort Worth Airport MORTIMER L. DOWNEY, Deputy Executive Director for Capital Programs, Metropolitan Transportation Authority. New York ALAN G. DUSTIN, President and Chief Executive Officer. Boston and Maine Corporation MARK G. GOODE, Engineer-Director. Texas State Department of Highways and Public Transportation LESTER A. HOEL, Hamilton Pvfessor, Chairman. Department of Civil Engineering. University of Virginia LOWELL B. JACKSON, Secretary, Wisconsin Department of Transportation ALAN F. KIEPPER, General Manager. Metropolitan Transit Authority, Houston HAROLD C. KING, Commtssioner, Virginia Department of Highways and Transportation FUJIO MATSUDA, President. University of Hawaii JAMES K. MITCHELL, Professor and Chairman. Department of Civil Engineering, University of California DANIEL T. MURPHY, County Executive, Oakland County Courthouse, Michigan ROLAND A. OUELLETTE, Director of Transportation Affairs. General Motors Corporation MILTON PIKARSKY. Director of Transportation Research. Illinois Institute of Technology -. WALTER W. SIMPSON, Vice President-Engineering, Norfolk Southern Corporation JOHN E. STEINER, Vice President. Corporate Product Development The Boeing Compony LEO J. TROMBATORE, Director. California Department of Transportation RICHARD A. WARD, Director-Chief Engineer. Oklahoma Department of Transportation TRANSPORTATION RESEARCH BOARD COMMITTEE FOR NRC OVERSIGHT (CNO) MILTON PIKARSKY, Illinois Institute of Technology (Chairman) JOHN R. BORCHERT University of Minnesota JOSEPH M. CLAPP, Roadway Expresss, Inc. MARK G. GOODE, Texas State Dept. of Hwys and Public Transp. NATIONAL COOPERATIVE TRANSIT RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM Transportation Research Board Executive Committee Subcommittee for the NCTRP.. JOSEPH M. CLAPP, Roadway Express. Inc. (Chairman). JOHN A. CLEMENTS, New Hampshire Dept. of Pub. Works and Hwys. LAWRENCE D. DAHMS, Metropolitan Transp. Commission, Berkeley, Calif JACK R. GILSTRAP, American Public Transit Association WILLIAM J. HARRIS, JR., Association of American Railroads RALPH STANLEY, Urban Mass Transportation Administration THOMAS B. DEEN, Transportation Research Board Field of Design Area of Track and Ancillary Systems Project Panel C43-1 EDWARD K. FARRELLY, The Port Authority of New York & New Jersey (Chairman) JAMES STEWART, Chicago Transit Authority GEORGE DONATO, Montreal Urban Community Transit Commission RAY WLODYKA, UMTA Liaison Representative JOHN C. MOULD, Federal Railroad Administration . FRANK J. CIHAK, ThG Liaison Representative GALEN SARNO, Utilities Engineering Bureau . EDWARD J. WARD, TRB Liaison Representative Pvgrom Staff . KRIEGER W. HENDERSON, JR., Director, Cooperative Research Programs ROBERT J. REILLY, Projects Engineer LOUIS M. MACGREGOR, Administrative Engineer HARRY A. SMITH. Projects Engineer CRAWFORD F. JENCKS, Projects Engineer ROBERT E. SPICHER, Projects Engineer. R. IAN KINGHAM, Projects Engineer HELEN MACK. Editor ..- ,. NATIONAL COOPERATIVE TRANSIT RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM Report 7 Detection of Low- Current Short Circuits NAVIN S. SAGAR Chas. T. Main, Inc. Boston, Massachusetts AREAS OF INTEREST Administration Maintenance Transportation Safety (Public Transit) (Rail Transportation) RESEARCH SPONSORED BY THE URBAN MASS TRANSPORTATION ADMINISTRATION OF THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION TRANSPORTATION RESEARCH BOARD NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL WASHINGTON, D.C. DECEMBER1984 NATIONAL COOPERATIVE TRANSIT RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM Administrators, engineers, and many others in the transit in- NCTRP REPORT 7 dustry are faced with a multitude of complex problems that range between local, regional, and national in their prevalence. Project 43-1 FY'81 ISSN 0732-4839 How they might be solved is open to a variety of approaches; ISBN 0-309-03712-3 however, it is an established fact that a highly effective approach Library of Congress Catalog Card No. 84-51540 to problems of widespread commonality is one is which oper- Price: $14.00 ating agencies join cooperatively to support, both in financial and other participatory respects, systematic research that is well designed, practically oriented, and carried out by highly com- petent researchers. As problems grow rapidly in number and NOTICE escalate in complexity, the value of an orderly, high-quality The project that is the subject of this report was a part of the National Cooperative cooperative endeavor likewise escalates. Transit Research & Development Program conducted by the Transportation Re- search Board with the approval of the Governing Board of the National Research Recognizing this in light of the many needs of the transit Council. Such approval reflects the Governing Board's judgment that the program industry at large, the Urban Mass Transportation Administra- concerned is of national importance and appropriate with respect to both the tion, U.S. Department of Transportation, got under way in 1980 purposes and resources of the National Research Council. The members of the technical committee selected to monitor this project and the National Cooperative Transit Research & Development Pro- to review this report were chosen for recognized scholarly competence and with gram (NCTRP). This is an objective national program that due consideration for the balance of disciplines appropriate to the project. The opinions and conclusions expressed or implied are those of the research agency provides a mechanism by which UMTA's principal client groups that performed the research, and, while they have been accepted as appropriate across the nation can join cooperatively in an attempt to solve by the technical committee, they sre.not necessarily those of the Transportation near-term public transportation problems through applied re- Research Board, the National Research Council, or the Urban Mass Transpor- tation Administration, U.S. Department of Transportation. search, development, test, and evaluation. The client groups Each report is reviewed and accepted for publication by the technical committee thereby have a channel through which they can directly influ- according to procedures established and monitored by the Transportation Research ence a portion of UMTA's annual activities in transit technology Board Executive Committee and the Governing Board of the National Research Council. development and deployment. Although present funding of the The National Research Council was established by the National Academy of NCTRP is entirely from UMTA's Section 6 funds, the planning Sciences in 1916 to associate the broad community of science and technology with the Academy's purposes of furthering knowledge and of advising the Federal leading to inception of the Program envisioned that UMTA's Government. The Council has become the principal operating agency of both the client groups would join ultimately in providing additional sup- National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering in the port, thereby enabling the Program to address a large number conduct of their services to the government, the public, and the scientific and engineering communities. It is administered jointly by both Academies and the of problems each year. Institute of Medicine. The National Academy of Engineering and the Institute of The NCTRP operates by means of agreements between Medicine were established in 1964 and 1970, respectively, under the charter of the National Academy of Sciences. UMTA as the sponsor and (1) the National Research Council The Transportation Research Board evolved in 1974 from the Highway Re- as the Primary Technical Contractor (PTC) responsible for ad- search Board which was established in 1920. The TRB incorporates all former ministrative and technical services and (2) the American Public HRB activities and also performs additional functions under a broader scope involving all modes of transportation and the interactions of transportation with Transit Association, responsible for operation of a Technical society. Steering Group (TSG) comprised of