Structural Health Monitoring is proved to be a promising technique improving continuity of service and safety of machines. Nevertheless few devices have been integrated into industrial maintenance routines, due to strong customer requirements, such as portability. In particular, we introduce an application devoted to the inspection of railway pantographs. This case study demands an adjustable actuation device, so as the inspection could be performed at different configurations of the mechanism. The solution adopts a cable, providing the static force needed to set the desired height for the test and a voice coil meant to apply the dynamic excitation. The main problem addressed is the design of a hybrid system that does not significantly alter the modal properties of the pantograph under inspection as long as verifying that the two actuators do not mutually interfere.
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