Railway Wheel Out-of-Roundness and Its Effects on Vehicle-Track Dynamics: A Review

Abstract

Wheel out-of-roundness (OOR), as the excitation of railway vehicle-track system, can cause intense vibration and has the potential to impose damage to both track and vehicle components. It may further increase the likelihood of derailment and deteriorate ride comfort. It is therefore necessary to study the effects of wheel OOR on the dynamic performance of these components and structures in operation. This chapter reviews the efforts on numerical simulation to analyse the properties of wheel roughness-induced vibration. The overview of wheel OOR is stated first including the initiation mechanism and consequences of wheel local defects and polygonisation. Several important issues in vehicle-track dynamic simulation for effect analysis of wheel OOR are then reviewed, including wheel defect simulation, wheel-rail contact model, the time-domain and frequency-domain approaches and different vehicle and track models.