Overview of electric railway systems and the calculation of train performance

Whilst many elements of a modern electric railway would still be recognisable to a nineteenth century pioneer traction engineer, notably the power supply arrangements and the traction motors, the methods of control would be a complete surprise. Electronic devices, both high-power silicon switches and low-power information processing chips, have revolutionised the control technologies employed to achieve smooth torque and speed control. These developments have caused several generations of equipment to appear and become outmoded within the last few decades and especially during recent years. Such equipments are orders of magnitude more complex than their early predecessors, and require much more engineering design and development. Furthermore, other aspects of the railway system have also advanced technically resulting in the need to analyse the interaction between elements such as the traction and signalling systems; in other words to apply genuine systems thinking to the railway as a whole.