Review of Current Maintenance Practices Used on Commuter and Passenger Rail Cars

Commuter and passenger railroads invest large amounts of capital to purchase and maintain their rolling stock. Funding for maintenance is largely derived from operating budgets with some funds coming from other sources. Realizing maintenance is vital to the safety and operations of their rolling stock, railroads use maintenance methodologies found in other industries along with government regulations and in-house practices to determine the best maintenance practice for their fleet. By using Condition Based Maintenance, Life Cycle Maintenance, and Reliability Centered Maintenance, railroads have increased reliability by isolating unreliable parts and performing corrective actions when needed. This increases scheduled maintenance and reduces unscheduled maintenance. However, unscheduled maintenance still impacts operations and reliability for railroads. Rolling stock repair costs due to unscheduled maintenance are not captured or analyzed so further improvement can be made in this area.