Evaluation of rail transportation vehicle lighting methods

Light Emitting Diode (LED) applications show a rapid development in recent years, thereby preference and use of these lighting apparatus becomes the new trend in electrical installations. Rail transportation conventional lighting systems, include such lamps as fluorescent and incandescent, are due to numerous unfavourable effects. Vibration, dust and voltage sags are responsible for electrical faults and malfunctions. Rail vehicles do have very long periods of working life, in accordance with this; installations on the vehicles shall have similar periods of maintenance characteristics. As conventional lighting systems due to more faults, using LED systems might be the solution in an economic and energy efficient point of view. In Turkey, rail lines often follow underground routes or have tunnels, therefore lighting systems of rail vehicles are switched on and off frequently. This switching activity causes additional unfavourable results as reduced life of lighting apparatus. Serial electrical wiring and lack of dimming controls are the other problems in rail transportation vehicles. In this study comparison of conventional and LED lighting systems is performed and best application methods are suggested for rail transportation vehicles in an electrical engineering standpoint.