Title: Stability analysis and derailment evaluation of rail vehicles

Authors: Yang-Tsai Fan, Wen-Fang Wu

Addresses: Department of Mechanical Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei, 10617 Taiwan. ' Department of Mechanical Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei, 10617 Taiwan

Abstract: A 28-degree-of-freedom dynamic model is proposed to study the stability of rail vehicles and examine the impact load caused by wheel-flat. Different kinds of track irregularity are considered as random inputs. The stability of the vehicle is discussed in detail and compared with available full-scale test data. It is found that numerical simulation results are in good agreement with test data for a certain type of vehicle. Both of them indicate the transverse acceleration of the bogie meets the required stability criteria. It is also found that derailment will not occur when the vehicle runs at its regular service speeds.

Keywords: rail vehicles; dynamic response; stability; wheel-flats; derailment.

DOI: 10.1504/IJHVS.2006.010018

International Journal of Heavy Vehicle Systems, 2006 Vol.13 No.3, pp.194 - 211

Published online: 08 Jun 2006 *

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