An investigation into the influence of wheel–rail contact relationships on the carbody hunting stability of an electric locomotive

Abstract

Carbody hunting stability has attracted more and more attention due to its great influence on the dynamic performance of a railway vehicle. To fully understand the correlation between the wheel–rail contact relationship and the carbody hunting stability of an electric locomotive, the wheel–rail contact geometry analysis and the multi-body dynamics simulation are carried out in this work. The focus is on the influences of track parameters (including rail profile, rail cant and track gauge) on wheel–rail contact relationships and carbody hunting stability. A group of rail profiles are obtained by interpolating between the standard CHN60 profile and the worn rail profiles. The nominal equivalent conicity, the effective equivalent conicity and the wheel–rail contact bandwidth for a wheelset lateral displacement of ±6 mm are used to evaluate the wheel–rail contact relationship, while the lateral continuous comfort index is used to evaluate the carbody hunting stability. The simulation results show that keeping the rail cant at about 1/40 and reducing the track gauge and the wear depth at the gauge corner of rail can improve the carbody hunting stability of the electric locomotive. Furthermore, the effective equivalent conicity is a good choice to establish the relationship between the wheel–rail contact geometry and the carbody hunting stability.

Keywords

Electric locomotive carbody hunting stability track parameters wheel–rail contact relationship lateral continuous comfort index

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Yang

Wei

Zhao

, et al. Current research progress in the mechanics of high speed rails. Adv Mech 2015; 45: 201507.

Chi

Zhang

Zeng

, et al. Influence of hunting motion on ride quality of railway vehicle. J Vib Eng 2008; 21(6): 639–643.

Sun

Wang

, et al. Analysis of wheel/rail contact geometric parameters’ effect on the dynamic behavior of high speed passenger car. China Railway Sci 2006; 27(5): 93–98.

Sun

. Influence of wheel–rail profile matching for high speed railway on vehicle dynamics performance. China Railway Sci 2017; 38(6): 108–117.

Sun

, et al. Influence of wheel wear on wheel–rail contact relationship and vehicle dynamic performance of high-speed EMU. China Railway Sci 2020; 41(6): 117–126.

Wang

Song

, et al. Wheel reprofiling interval optimization based on dynamic behavior evolution for high speed train. Wear 2016; 366–367: 316–324.

Shi

Wang

, et al. Field measurements of the evolution of wheel wear and vehicle dynamics for high-speed trains. Veh Syst Dyn 2018; 56(8): 1187–1206.

Liu

Bruni

. Influence of individual wheel profiles on the assessment of running dynamics of a rail vehicle by numerical simulation: a case study. Veh Syst Dyn 2021: 1–20. DOI: 10.1080/00423114.2021.1901940.

Wei

Zeng

Chi

, et al. Carbody elastic vibration of high-speed vehicles caused by bogie hunting instability. Veh Syst Dyn 2017; 55(9): 1321–1342.

10.

Chi

Cai

Liang

, et al. Influences of rail grinding deviations on vehicle dynamics performances of high speed railways. China Mech Eng 2019; 30(3): 261–265.283.

11.

Matsudaira

. Hunting problem of high-speed railway vehicles with special reference to bogie design for the new Tokaido line. Proc Imeche 1965; 180(6): 58–66.

12.

Anderson

Fortin

. Low conicity instabilities in forced-steering railway vehicles. Veh Syst Dyn 1988; 17(1): 17–28.

13.

Wickens

. Fundamentals of rail vehicle dynamics. London: CRC Press, 2005.

14.

Stichel

. On freight wagon dynamics and track deterioration. Proc Imeche F J Rail Rapid Transit 1999; 213: 243–254.

15.

Stichel

. How to improve the running behaviour of freight wagons with UIC-link suspension. In: Roads and on Tracks Supplement to Vehicle System Dynamics Volume 33 Proceedings of the 16th IAVSD Symposium, Pretoria, South Africa, 30 August–September 3 1999.

16.

Shi

Dai

Wang

, et al. Research on low-frequency swaying mechanism of metro vehicles based on wheel–rail relationship. Shock Vib 2020: 8878020.

17.

Sun

Chi

Cai

, et al. Numerical investigation into the critical speed and frequency of the hunting motion in railway vehicle system. Math Probl Eng 2019; 2019: 1–15.

18.

Zeng

, et al. Low-frequency carbody sway modelling based on low wheel–rail contact conicity analysis. Shock Vib 2020; 2020: 1–17.

19.

Scheffel

. The influence of the suspension on the hunting stability of railways. Rail Int 1979; 10: 662–696.

20.

Sun

Chi

Jin

, et al. Experimental and numerical study on carbody hunting of electric locomotive induced by low wheel–rail contact conicity. Veh Syst Dyn 2021; 59(2): 203–223.

21.

Sun

Chi

Cai

, et al. An investigation into evaluation methods for ride comfort of railway vehicles in the case of carbody hunting instability. Proc Imeche F J Rail Rapid Transit 2021; 235(5): 586–597.

22.

British Standards Institute BS EN . 14363 Railway applications-testing for the acceptance of running characteristics of railway vehicles-testing of running behavior and stationary testsInteroperability unit valenciennes. London: Interoperability Unit, 2005.

23.

Official Journal of the European Union . 2008/232/EC concerning a technical specification for interoperability relating to ‘rolling stock’ sub-system of the trans- European high-speed rail system. Available at: http://www.ojec.com/? (2008).

24.

Chen

Cui

Sun

, et al. Grinding management of rail profile based on abnormal hunting of high-speed train. Elec Drive Locomot 2020; 5: 128–131.137.

25.

Polach

. Characteristic parameters of nonlinear wheel/rail contact geometry. Veh Syst Dyn 2010; 48: 19–36.

26.

Wang

. The track of wheel contact points and the calculation of wheel/rail geometric contact parameters. J Southwest Jiaotong Univ 1984; 1: 89–99.

27.

Arnold

Netter

. Apporoximation of contact geometry in the dynamical simulation of wheel-rail. Math Comp Model Dyn Syst 1998; 4: 162–184.

28.

Code 519 UIC . Method for determining the equivalent conicity. 1st ed. Paris: International Union of Railways, 2004.

29.

Sun

Chi

, et al. Hunting motion stability of wheelset based on energy method. J Traffic Trans Eng 2018; 18(2): 82–89.

30.

Gan

Dai

Gao

, et al. Wheel-rail wear progression of high speed train with type S1002CN wheel treads. Wear 2015; 328–329: 569–581.

31.

Klingel

. Ueber den Lauf der eisenbahnwagen auf gerader Bahn, Organ Fortschr, Eisenbahnwes. Neue Folge 1883; 38: 113–123.

32.

Iwnicki

. Handbook of railway vehicle dynamics. Oxfordshire, UK: Taylor & Francis Group, 2006.