The subject of improving the competitiveness and efficiency of railway rolling stock is highly demanded as the railway transport consider the nerve of the goods transport in the hole word. One of the requirements to develop the railway transport related to the continuous improvement of existing materials and find a new material which would satisfy such conflicting requirements as relia-bility, sustainability, producibility and the manufacturing process automation possibility. The researches show that use of polymer composite materials (PCM) in the production of both passenger and freight railway rolling stock, provides lightweight, improves its performance, increases durability and reduces operating costs.

This paper presents a new technology of continuous measurement and recording of forces in wheel/rail contact by measuring strains in two rail cross-sections, which allows increasing the measurement accuracy. The method for processing the measurement data is proposed with a variable scale between strains and force, depending on the instantaneous position of the wheel with respect to a span between sleepers. The gage characteristics obtained by rolling a wheel over the rail between two sleepers are approximated by using Fourier series abilities and used for the assessment of wheel/rail forces. By using the suggested technology, the amount of information obtained increased 2 times.

Determine and control the impact of rolling stock on the railway track, one of the significant subjects of railway engineering, especially with heavy traffic and innovative freight cars with increased axle loads. Different methods utilized to measure the lateral impact of rolling stock on a railway based on the use of strain gauges installed on the rail differ in the location of strain gauges and the specifics of processing the received signals. The shortage of these methods that the lateral force arising from the wheel/rail interaction determined when the wheel position over the strain gauges sections. Therefore, continuous registration of details in the wheel/rail contact is impossible. Multiple passes of the test rolling stock along the measuring section are required to receive the right results. In this article, a new method developed to continue recording the lateral forces of the wheel/rail interaction by measuring stresses in two sections of the rail on a significant part of the sleeper space. The railway track experiments approved this method’s ability to restore the lateral force of not more than 4% standard deviation along the measuring zone’s length and increased the volume of reliable statistical data obtained, improved the measurement accuracy, and reduced the time and cost.

This work demonstrates a biodegradable resistive pressure sensor fabricated by a solvent-free, low cost but highly efficient method. The sensor shows a high sensitivity of 4.77%/kPa, a fast response of 0.3 ms and a relaxation time of 8 ms. The capability of the sensor attached to the human body and measuring human motion in real-time indicates its potential for human motion detection, touch displays and tactile sensing applications.

This chapter suggested new methods for monitoring the dynamic processes of rolling stock/rail interaction. This study develops a new technical solution for measuring the wheel/rail interaction forces on a significant part of the sleeper. The theoretical part of this study, using FEM, confirm the ability of piecewise continuous recording of vertical and lateral forces from the wheel/rail interaction by measuring the stresses in two sections of the rail. Also, the optimum location of strain gauges and the effective length of the measuring zone have been determined. The experimental part of this study has been carried out on the stands and the railway track to confirm the effectiveness of the method to determine the vertical and lateral wheel/rail interaction forces, increase the reliable statistical data, improve the measurement accuracy, reducing the time and cost compared with current testing methods. The developed method is recommended to determine the wheel/rail interaction forces and identify defects on the wheels when diagnosing rolling stock on operational and travel regimes.