CHARACTERIZATION OF TRANSVERSE CRACK AND CRACK GROWTH IN A RAILWAY RAIL

To ensure the rail transportations safety, evaluation of fatigue behavior of the rail steel is necessary. High cycle fatigue behaviour of a rail steel was the subject of investigation in this research using fracture mechanics. Finite element method (FEM) was used for analyzing the distribution of the stresses on the rail, exerted by the external load. FEM analysis showed that the maximum longitudinal stresses occurred on the railhead. To find out about the relation of crack growth with its critical size, and to estimate its lifetime, the behaviour of transverse cracks to rail direction was studied using damage tolerance concept. It revealed that transverse crack growth initially occurred slowly, but it accelerated once the crack size became larger. Residual service life was calculated for defective segments of the rails. In addition, allowable crack size for different non-destructive testing intervals was determined; the allowable crack size decreased as the NDT intervals increased.