A tool for calculating braking distances of rail vehicles

In the article a tool for calculating the braking distance of rail vehicles developed as part of R&D project conducted at the Institute of Rail Vehicles in Poznan (Poland) was presented. The tool used high-level programming language – Python for determining the braking distance of railway vehicles in accordance with the algorithm presented in the EN 14531 standard. The developed tool takes into account the theoretical curve of pressure build-up in the brake cylinder and the variability of the friction coefficient with time during the braking process. The paper presents the results of calculating the braking distance of the electric multiple unit.