Heave-Pitch-Roll Dynamics of Flexible Vehicle in Variable Velocity Run

Analysis for response statistics evaluation of a flexible vehicle travelling with variable velocity over nonhomogeneously profiled flexible track is presented with a heave-pitch-roll model. The vehicle body is idealised as a flexible member with variable cross-section, inertia, damping and stiffness distributions. The vehicle may also have variable section slender elastic attachments. Coupled dynamics with rigid body heave-pitch-roll modes and elastic bending-torsion modes of the vehicle body along with coupled bending-torsion modes of the attachments are considered. Equivalent linear suspension system characteristics are employed for developing the analysis. Numerical results are presented for an aircraft with tricycle landing gear arrangements and comparison is made with other models.     

Heave-Pitch-Roll Dynamics of Flexible Vehicle in Variable Velocity Run

Analysis for response statistics evaluation of a flexible vehicle travelling with variable velocity over nonhomogeneously profiled flexible track is presented with a heave-pitch-roll model. The vehicle body is idealised as a flexible member with variable cross-section, inertia, damping and stiffness distributions. The vehicle may also have variable section slender elastic attachments. Coupled dynamics with rigid body heave-pitch-roll modes and elastic bending-torsion modes of the vehicle body along with coupled bending-torsion modes of the attachments are considered. Equivalent linear suspension system characteristics are employed for developing the analysis. Numerical results are presented for an aircraft with tricycle landing gear arrangements and comparison is made with other models.     

Coupling Model of Vertical and Lateral Vehicle/Track Interactions

A new dynamic model of vehicle/track interaction is presented. The model considers the vehicle and the track as a whole system and couples the vertical interaction with the lateral interaction. The vehicle subsystem is modeled as a multi-body system with 37 degrees of freedom, which runs on the track with a constant velocity. The track substructure is modeled as a discretely supported system of elastic beams representing the rails, sleepers and ballasts. The normal contact forces between wheels and rails are described by Hertzian nonlinear elastic contact theory and the tangential wheel/ rail forces are decided by the creep theory. Numerical results are compared with those of conventional dynamic models of railway vehicles. Applications of the coupling model to the investigation of safety limits against derailment due to the track twist and the combined alignment and cross-level irregularities are reported at the end of the paper.     

Dynamic responses of a high-speed railway car due to wheel polygonalisation

The polygonal wear around the wheel circumference could pose highly adverse influences on the wheel/rail interactions and thereby the performance of the vehicle system. In this study, the effects of wheel polygonalisation on the dynamic responses of a high-speed rail vehicle are investigated through development and simulations of a comprehensive coupled vehicle/track dynamic model. The model integrates flexible slab track, wheelsets and axle boxes subsystem models so as to account for elastic deformations caused by impact loads induced by the wheel polygonalisation. A field-test programme was undertaken to acquire the polygonal wear profile and axle box acceleration response of a high-speed train, and the data are used to demonstrate the validity of the coupled vehicle/track system model. Subsequently, the effects of wheel polygonalisation are evaluated in terms of wheel/rail impact forces, axle box vertical acceleration and dynamic stress developed in the axle considering different amplitudes and harmonic orders of the polygonal wear. The results suggest that the high-order wheel polygonalisation can give rise to high-frequency impact loads at the wheel/rail interface, and excite some of the vibration modes of the wheelset and the axle box leading to high-magnitude axle box acceleration and dynamic stress in the wheelset axle.     

Integration of car-body flexibility into train–track coupling system dynamics analysis

The resonance vibration of flexible car-bodies greatly affects the dynamics performances of high-speed trains. In this paper, we report a three-dimensional train–track model to capture the flexible vibration features of high-speed train carriages based on the flexible multi-body dynamics approach. The flexible car-body is modelled using both the finite element method (FEM) and the multi-body dynamics (MBD) approach, in which the rigid motions are obtained by using the MBD theory and the structure deformation is calculated by the FEM and the modal superposition method. The proposed model is applied to investigate the influence of the flexible vibration of car-bodies on the dynamics performances of train–track systems. The dynamics performances of a high-speed train running on a slab track, including the car-body vibration behaviour, the ride comfort, and the running safety, calculated by the numerical models with rigid and flexible car-bodies are compared in detail. The results show that the car-body flexibility not only significantly affects the vibration behaviour and ride comfort of rail carriages, but also can has an important influence on the running safety of trains. The rigid car-body model underestimates the vibration level and ride comfort of rail vehicles, and ignoring carriage torsional flexibility in the curving safety evaluation of trains is conservative.     

High frequency railway vehicle-track dynamics through flexible rotating wheelsets

Some railway problems, such as the corrugation of rails or the impact caused by a wheelflat, are associated with a vehicle–track coupled dynamic phenomenon. Models for the analysis of these problems must account for the structural vibrations of the track components (rails and sleepers), but the most adequate approach for the wheelset has not been sufficiently investigated until present. The wheelset can be considered as an undeformable solid, as an elastic structure where the rotation effects are neglected, or as a rotating flexible solid. In order to fill this gap, this article presents a methodology to use the structural vibrations of a rotating wheelset in high-frequency railway dynamics analyses. The model makes use of Eulerian modal coordinates, a formulation that provides very low computational cost. The method is applied in this article to a wheelflat impact calculation and a vehicle running on a corrugated track. The results show the importance of the more realistic model in the simulations, mainly in certain frequencies.     

基于复式伸缩窗的车辆排队与消散快速检测算法

基于视频图像处理方法,提出了一种复式伸缩窗来实时跟踪交叉口排队车辆队尾和队头的位置变化,从而准确描述交叉口车辆排队形成和消散过程。通过检测指定区域内车辆是否存在和是否运动,分别构建跟踪排队队尾和队头的队尾伸缩窗和队头伸缩窗。描述排队首尾伸缩变化的复式伸缩窗则由这两个伸缩窗相互协作所构成。根据跟踪队尾和队头的结果,车辆排队长度和停车延迟时间等重要参数就可以轻易得到。试验结果表明本文算法能实时准确地跟踪队尾和队头的位置,能适应不同天气环境和光照变化,其准确率达到92%以上,较好地满足车辆堵塞监控和交通信号灯控制的需要。     

装甲车辆非稳定工况驱动性能仿真模型

基于发动机和传动系统的动态过程，本文开发了一个装甲车辆非稳定工况的驱动性能仿真模型。对一台装甲车辆的加速过程进行了实例仿真计算，计算结果与实测值符合较好。这个仿真模型可以方便地用于装甲车辆非稳定工况动力性能的研究。     

Carbody elastic vibrations of high-speed vehicles caused by bogie hunting instability

In particular locations of the high-speed track, the worn wheel profile matched up with the worn rail profile will lead to an extremely high-conicity wheel–rail contact. Consequently, the bogie hunting instability arises, which further results in the so-called carbody shaking phenomenon. In this paper, the carbody elastic vibrations of a high-speed vehicle in service are firstly introduced. Modal tests are conducted to identity the elastic modes of the carbody. The ride comfort and running safety indices for the tested vehicle are evaluated. The rigid–flexible coupling dynamic model for the high-speed passenger car is then developed by using the FE and MBS coupling approach. The rail profiles in those particular locations are measured and further integrated into the simulation model to reproduce the bogie hunting and carbody elastic vibrations. The effects of wheel and rail wear on the vehicle system response, e.g. wheelset bifurcation graph and carbody vibrations, are studied. Two improvement measures, including the wheel profile modification and rail grinding, are proposed to provide possible solutions. It is found that the wheel–rail contact conicity can be lowered by decreasing wheel flange thickness or grinding rail corner, which is expected to improve the bogie hunting stability under worn rail and worn wheel conditions. The carbody elastic vibrations caused by bogie hunting instability can be further restrained.     

Design and validation of a slender guideway for Maglev vehicle by simulation and experiment

Normally, Maglev (magnetic levitation) vehicles run on elevated guideways. The elevated guideway must satisfy various load conditions of the vehicle, and has to be designed to ensure ride quality, while ensuring that the levitation stability of the vehicle is not affected by the deflection of the guideway. However, because the elevated guideways of Maglev vehicles in South Korea and other countries fabricated so far have been based on over-conservative design criteria, the size of the structures has increased. Further, from the cost perspective, they are unfavourable when compared with other light rail transits such as monorail, rubber wheel, and steel wheel automatic guided transit. Therefore, a slender guideway that does have an adverse effect on the levitation stability of the vehicle is required through optimisation of design criteria. In this study, to predict the effect of various design parameters of the guideway on the dynamic behaviour of the vehicle, simulations were carried out using a dynamics model similar to the actual vehicle and guideway, and a limiting value of deflection ratio of the slender guideway to ensure levitation control is proposed. A guideway that meets the requirement as per the proposed limit for deflection ratio was designed and fabricated, and through a driving test of the vehicle, the validity of the slender guideway was verified. From the results, it was confirmed that although some increase in airgap and cabin acceleration was observed with the proposed slender guideway when compared with the conventional guideway, there was no notable adverse effect on the levitation stability and ride quality of the vehicle. Therefore, it can be inferred that the results of this study will become the basis for establishing design criteria for slender guideways of Maglev vehicles in future.     

High-speed wheel/rail contact determining method with rotating flexible wheelset and validation under wheel polygon excitation

A rotating flexible wheelset model is developed and integrated into a vehicle/track dynamic model. Flexible wheelset modes with natural frequencies less than 1000?Hz are considered in the wheelset modelling. An innovation of the paper is that wheel/rail rolling contact calculation considers the effect of the wheelset flexibility and the rotating effect. By introducing two half dummy rigid wheelsets the rolling contact between the flexible wheelset and the two rails can be transformed to that between a rigid wheelset and the rails. As an extension application, the wheel OOR (Out-Of-Round) wears with the 11th, 15th, and 17th orders are used to the vehicle system dynamic model with rigid, flexible and rotating-flexible wheelset model. The results of the three models are compared to study the influence of wheelset flexibility and rotation. The ‘online searching contact method’ developed in this paper is compared with the traditional contact method with considering the rotating flexible wheelset. And then a measured OOR is used to excite the rotating flexible wheelset, the response of which is analysed and verified.     

Modal Controllers for Active Steering of Railway Vehicles with Solid Axle Wheelsets

This paper presents the development of a modal control strategy for the active steering of solid axle railway vehicles and reveals benefits of actively stabilising the wheelsets of a railway vehicle. A modal decomposition is applied to a 2-axle railway vehicle to de-couple its body lateral and yaw motions and hence to allow more detailed analysis of the vehicle behaviour and more robust design of active controllers. Independent controllers for the two motions are developed based on the two de-coupled modes. Parameter variations such as creep coefficients and wheelset conicity are taken into account in the design process to guarantee a robust design. The study shows that, compared to a passive vehicle, the vehicles with actively steered wheelsets not only perform much better on a curved track, but also improve the ride quality on straight track. Computer simulations are used in the study to verify the development of the controllers and assess the system performance with the control scheme proposed.     

On the effect of unsupported sleepers on the dynamic behaviour of a railway track

The effect of unsupported sleepers on the dynamic behaviour of a railway track is studied based on vehicle–track dynamic interaction theory, using a model of the track as a Timoshenko beam supported on a periodic elastic foundation. Considering the vehicle's running speed and the number of unsupported sleepers, the track dynamic characteristics are investigated and verified in the time and frequency domains by experiments on a 1:5 scale model wheel–rail test rig. The results show that when hanging sleepers are present, leading to a discontinuous and irregular track support, additional wheel–rail interaction forces are generated. These forces increase as further sleepers become unsupported and as the vehicle's running speed increases. The adjacent supports experience increased dynamic forces which will lead to further deterioration of track quality and the formation of long wavelength track irregularities, which worsen the vehicles’ running stability and riding comfort. Stationary transfer functions measurements of the dynamic behaviour of the track are also presented to support the findings.     

Lateral Stability of Towed Flexible Vehicles

The highway transport of mobile homes is a matter of concern for the increasingly safety-minded driving public. The low speeds of towed vehicles necessary to maintain stability, together with the requirements for excessive lane widths due to clearance for the lateral motion, result in increased likelihood of traffic accidents, impeded traffic flow, and reduced highway capacity. A safe increase in the stable cruising speed, coupled with a decreased amplitude in the pendular motion helps alleviate all three of the aforementioned problems. Energy input at hitch point and lateral forces between the road and tires permit lateral vehicular motions, which occur above a critical speed, to increase in amplitude until possibly a limit cycle or instability is reached. One would expect that structural dynamics could have a pronounced influence on the lateral response of towed vehicles with large and relatively flexible chassis, such as mobile homes. The objective of this research is to determine the influence of chassis structural parameters on the lateral stability of towed flexible bodies during transport. The mass of the towing vehicle is assumed infinitely large, thus eliminating any dynamic interconnection between the towing and towed vehicles. The assumed modes method is used to describe the lateral deflection of the flexible towed vehicle. Results of the study of this model indicate that increase in structural rigidity of towed vehicle increases the critical towing speed whereas increase in the tire cornering coefficient reduces the safe towing speed, which is true only for this simplified model where the dynamic interaction with the towing vehicle is not included.     

Modal Controllers for Active Steering of Railway Vehicles with Solid Axle Wheelsets

This paper presents the development of a modal control strategy for the active steering of solid axle railway vehicles and reveals benefits of actively stabilising the wheelsets of a railway vehicle. A modal decomposition is applied to a 2-axle railway vehicle to de-couple its body lateral and yaw motions and hence to allow more detailed analysis of the vehicle behaviour and more robust design of active controllers. Independent controllers for the two motions are developed based on the two de-coupled modes. Parameter variations such as creep coefficients and wheelset conicity are taken into account in the design process to guarantee a robust design. The study shows that, compared to a passive vehicle, the vehicles with actively steered wheelsets not only perform much better on a curved track, but also improve the ride quality on straight track. Computer simulations are used in the study to verify the development of the controllers and assess the system performance with the control scheme proposed.     

Effects of rail thermal stress on the dynamic response of vehicle and track

A new method is proposed to obtain the dynamic responses of the vehicle–track coupling system under the conditions of rail thermal stress changes in high-speed railways. Exact models are established with different rail longitudinal forces, in which multibody dynamic models are used for vehicles and the direct stiffness method for structures. In order to provide a general, simple and flexible formulation to express longitudinal stress distribution, the accurate model of long slab track consists of many small units with parameters which can be initialised separately. The exact analytical equation of track frequency and modal function was obtained by the transition matrix method, which can be used in calculating the dynamic response of wheel–rail coupling model. The proposed model is verified through comparisons with other classical solutions. Under the influence of train velocities and track irregularities, the specific vibration performances that frequency shifted and amplitude peak enhanced with thermal force are demonstrated through examples. The results show that the response analyses of vehicle and track have great application potentiality for fast estimation of the rail longitudinal stress.     

Validation of Railway Vehicle Lateral Dynamics Models

The general form of the railway vehicle lateral dynamic predictions seems to have been proven. If wheels are coned, rails are of uniform cross-section, and suspensions are linear, then good predictions can be obtained. If wheels are not coned, and rail sections vary, but the suspension is relatively linear, as in modern vehicles, it is still possible to obtain good predictions of critical speed for flexible suspensions. The situation with “stiff” vehicles remains unproven. In each case dynamic response calculations will be only as good as the knowledge of the track input including the rolling line term. The validity of making calculations to predict critical speeds of very non-linear vehicles has not yet been convincingly demonstrated. Validation experiments for the more difficult case of time history representation suggest the possibility of correct prediction for easily comprehensible vehicles, but even this requires an enormous amount of supportive experimental work.     

Validation of Railway Vehicle Lateral Dynamics Models

SUMMARY

The general form of the railway vehicle lateral dynamic predictions seems to have been proven. If wheels are coned, rails are of uniform cross-section, and suspensions are linear, then good predictions can be obtained. If wheels are not coned, and rail sections vary, but the suspension is relatively linear, as in modern vehicles, it is still possible to obtain good predictions of critical speed for flexible suspensions. The situation with “stiff” vehicles remains unproven. In each case dynamic response calculations will be only as good as the knowledge of the track input including the rolling line term. The validity of making calculations to predict critical speeds of very non-linear vehicles has not yet been convincingly demonstrated. Validation experiments for the more difficult case of time history representation suggest the possibility of correct prediction for easily comprehensible vehicles, but even this requires an enormous amount of supportive experimental work.     

Influence of compliance for an elastokinematic model of a proposed rear suspension

The research is carried out to improve passenger’s comfort to increase the vehicles stability in dynamic conditions. The literature available in the automotive engineering considers different topics for studying suspensions. An example represents mechanisms structure and analysis (synthesis, kinematics, and dynamics) under various operating conditions. These aspects have been approached before analytically, numerical. The current paper studies the influence of the lateral force on the contact patch of the wheel and the corresponding variations of vehicle stability parameters, such as camber angle and wheel rear track. The study is performed for a newer innovative rear suspensions mechanism which does not have a wheel track and camber angle variation, relative to the chassis, when the suspension components was considered rigid. A numerical solution is obtained through a virtual model on several commercial codes: MSC Adams, Patran, Nastran. Concerning the analysed parametes, their variation increases as the applied force is increased. Moreover, the largest variation corresponds to the case were elastic bushings and deformable links are considered.