DRIVING SYSTEM, DRIVING SYSTEM FOR RAILROAD-VEHICLE, AND RAILROAD-VEHICLE AND MULTI-CAR TRAIN MOUNTED WITH SAME

摘要

There have been proposed, as a method of using an optimum power supply for each of an electrified section and a non-electrified section, a system that supports a plurality of different power sources (overhead power line, a generator driven by an engine, fuel cell). However, since different power converters were necessary for each of the power sources, there were issues in that the weight of a multi-car train increased, the degree of freedom in composing the multi-car train decreased because mounting space for the power converters needed to be secured, maintenance cost increased, and reliability decreased due to an increase in the number of parts. A driving system of the present invention is provided with: power conversion circuits that have the same number of AC input ends as an AC power supply having the maximum number of phases, among a plurality of different AC power supplies, and that are for converting AC power to DC power; and switching means for switching the connection states between the AC power supplies and the power conversion circuits. The driving system switches the connection states in accordance with the selected power supply.