The off-line discharge between the pantograph and catenary (PAC) occurs frequently in the actual operation of an electric locomotive, which affects the quality of the received current and the service life of the pantograph. The current experiments on the off-line discharge between the PAC are mainly low-power ones and the models established are static. To study the electrical behaviors during the PAC relative motion under the actual working conditions, in this paper, the voltage and current of the contact wire (CW) during its motion are measured. And the electrical behaviors during the rise, fall and reciprocating motions of the pantograph are investigated by combining a finite element method (FEM) model based on the magnetohydrodynamics with the auto transformer (AT) traction network circuit and moving mesh method. It is found that the harmonic frequencies are mainly in the range of 0-30 MHz. The voltage distortion is more obvious during the fall of the pantograph. And the negative polarity spike pulse has a larger amplitude and occurs more frequently. The novelty of this paper lies in the experimental test with the high current and high power, as well as the systematic analysis of the electrical behaviors and multi-physical field evolution during the motion of the pantograph under the working conditions. Its contribution is to present an effective method to study the dynamic behaviors of the PAC. The research results can provide an important reference for the identification of the electrical characteristics of the PAC and the protection of the PAC equipment.
