Combining MBS with FEM for Simulation of the Stresses in Rails under Wheel Loads

The stresses in rails under wheel loads have a strong bearing on the safety of railway transportation. A prediction of stresses in rails is of interest to both manufacturers and operators. In the past, several models have been developed for the problem. However, due to the complexity of the problem, there is still no ¿standard model¿ available. The issue addressed in this paper is how to design a suitable method for prediction of stresses in rails under wheel loads. Multi-body system models of b4000 typical metro vehicles running on a range of curves have been simulated in ADAMS/Rail and the predicted wheel-rail contact forces have been used to generate rail stresses using two finite element models. The FE model by ANSYS represents a global length of railway track with ballast and sleepers to calculate rail bending stresses. The FE model by DELNAS is a more detailed three dimensional model to calculate contact stresses on rail surface. The predicted forces were validated against test measurements from one site on the Beijing city rail network.