Twin disc tests are commonly used to study wear in railway materials. In this work the implementation of a numerical model of the twin disc arrangement is given, which reproduces the distribution of tangential forces over the contact patch between the two discs. Wear is subsequently calculated by relating the forces and creepage between the two discs using three different wear functions found in the literature. The resulting wear rates are compared with experimental data for discs made of common railway wheel and rail steels. This allows a comparison and assessment of the validity of the different wear algorithms considered.

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b Régie autonome des transports parisiens (RATP)

One of the key-elements of train design is the wheelset lifetime, which is strongly dependent on the levels of wheel wear. In order to reduce costs and increase safety, wheel wear needs to be predicted with increasing precision. In the past few years specific tools have been introduced to combine the predicted dynamic data from multi-body models, with the analytical computation of the wheel-rail contact parameters, to achieve an improved wear prediction. The aim of the present work is to consider the different methodologies for wear prediction and to create a wear prediction tool which is based on available railway dynamics codes enhanced by improved rolling contact analysis, combined with recent research on wear.