The existing method to measure the contact force between pantograph and contact wire does not deal with the horizontal component, which the authors believe to have important information on current collection conditions. So the authors propose a new method to measure it based on the measuring the torsion of the panhead with strain gages. This method can also estimate the vertical component of the contact force with the same strain gages concurrently. This paper introduces this method and describes the results of an excitation test to estimate its measuring accuracy. The test results show that the horizontal component of the contact force up to 20Hz can be correctly measured together with its vertical component.