Performance Evaluation of Miniaturized Antenna of the Shinkansen Used for Overhead Line Voltage Detection and Wireless Communication

Reducing the noise from the sound of train travel is an important issue in high-speed railways such as the Shinkansen. There has been no change in the shape of the antenna installed on the roof on the leading car of the Tokaido Shinkansen since the line started service, even though this is a source of the noise. Here, by changing (miniaturizing) the shape of this antenna from the standpoint of noise countermeasures, we developed an antenna that satisfied both the overhead line voltage detection performance and wireless detection performance, analyzed its performance by examination in factory and running tests, and confirmed that it can be provided for practical use. In this paper, we report a summary of the antenna, the results of the performance evaluation under environments of rain and accumulated snow, and the results of performance evaluation by running tests.