Dynamic Impact of a Rail Vehicle on a Rail Infrastructure with Particular Focus on the Phenomenon of Threshold Effect

Abstract

The paper undertakes analysis of the dynamic impact of a rail vehicle on various types of a railway infrastructure with particular focus on the phenomenon of threshold effect within the transition zones of an engineering facility. The problem of locally variable stiffness of the railway infrastructure, which in turn could lead to the accelerated infrastructure degradation, is identified. Using the analytical and numerical background, the computational model is presented, based on which, it could be possible to determine the impact of the various rail support on the dynamic response of the entire infrastructure. The dynamic load, caused by the passage of the multiaxle rail vehicle, is taken into account in the paper. The fourth-order differential equation is solved by using the finite differences method with application of the numerical MATLAB script. The created numerical algorithm and a number of calculations allowed the formulation of several solutions that could reduce the dynamic impact of the rail vehicle on the railway surface within the transition zones. In the paper, theoretical results are compared to the field measurements conducted on a real dynamically loaded rail. Field experiments have been carried out on the railway track in operation. The vertical displacement of a rail, dynamically loaded by various types of rail vehicles passing by (both passenger and freight trains) has been investigated. Researches have been carried out in the area of transition zones of engineering facilities. Test points have been selected in places where there is a sudden change in parameters of the track structure (e.g., a change from concrete sleepers to wooden sleepers). Based on conducted researches it has been possible to validate results obtained from the numerical calculations.

Running Dynamics of Rail Vehicles

“…Idczak et al investigate the dynamic impact of rail transport on the surrounding infrastructure with a particular focus on the phenomenon of the threshold effect within the transition zones of an engineering facility [3]. The problem of locally variable stiffness of the railway infrastructure, which could lead to accelerated infrastructure degradation, is identified.…”

Numerical Investigation of Pre-Stressed Reinforced Concrete Railway Sleeper for High-Speed Application

“…• the consideration of changing the strength and elastic moduli of concretes during the lifespan of the sleepers [38]; • investigation of transition zones between significantly different vertical stiffnesses [39,40]; • examination of the crack growing in concrete sleepers [17][18][19][20]23,24,36,38,41]; • investigation of settlements of ballasted tracks with increased sleeper space [42]; • taking into consideration the noise and/or vibration reduction with different sleepers [27]; • development of RC sleepers for a 40 ton axle load [22]; • examination of environmentally friendly production technology [43]; • investigation of fault production of RC sleepers and the possible reasons for it [44]; • development and analysis of RC sleepers of tramway tracks [31]; • analysis of the debonding effect of twin-block slab tracks [45]; • investigation of the 3D modeling of RC sleepers with the consideration of static, dynamic, and impact loads [30,31,33,35,38,[40][41][42]46,47]; • analysis of the features of the stress-strain state of the dual gauge track with a special design of reinforced concrete sleepers with the simultaneous fastening of four rails [48].…”