EXPERIMENTAL CHARACTERIZATION OF WHEEL AND RAIL SURFACE ROUGHNESS

For several years, studies carried out in Europe have shown the need to consider wheel and rail surface roughness as a major excitation parameter in railway rolling noise. Measuring the rail roughness may be critical in the assessment of the noise created by the wheel/track system. It can be measured by means of two complementary methods: rect scanning method allows a spectral representation of roughness levels that can be strongly influenced by the applied data processing. It must include the removal of sharp spikes resulting from pits or spikes, which are not representative of the actual excitation of the wheel/rail system.