No abstract

In this work, we have developed a serial-chain multibody model of a rail vehicle, using the Decoupled Natural Orthogonal Complement matrices. The governing equations of the system were linearized, and the start of hunting was identified by finding the Smallest Bifurcation Point (SBP) of the trivial solution. Uneven wear creates differences in the properties of similar components in a rail vehicle. It was found that such variations are neglected in the hunting analysis. Hence, we introduce these differences by independently changing 32 parameters. The study found that these variations lead to unique trends. Then, these trends were used to recommend design changes for a rail vehicle, which could be thought of, in order to improve the hunting characteristics. For this purpose, an interactive software tool was created to easily visualize, and manipulate the hunting behavior of a rail vehicle.

In this study, a simulation tool -Railhunt was developed using App Designer toolbox of MATLAB software to study the hunting stability of a railway vehicle. The fundamental architecture of the GUI is presented. Features to facilitate user friendly experience of the tool are described. Benefits of having a specialized simulation tool would allow the researchers and engineers to perform design studies on railway vehicles efficiently with automated formulation of dynamic equations at the backend.