A passive road-rail crossing design to minimise wheel-rail contact failure risk under frontal collision of trains onto stuck trucks. (October 2017)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Ling, Liang; Dhanasekar, Manicka; Thambiratnam, David P.
• Is Part Of: Engineering failure analysis. Volume 80(2017)
• Page Start: 403
• Page End: 415
• Publication Date: 2017-10
• Subjects: Railway infrastructure -- Collisions -- Road-rail crossing -- Passive safety -- Multibody dynamics; System failures (Engineering) -- Periodicals; Fracture mechanics -- Periodicals; Reliability (Engineering) -- Periodicals; Pannes -- Périodiques; Rupture, Mécanique de la -- Périodiques; Fiabilité -- Périodiques; Fracture mechanics; Reliability (Engineering); System failures (Engineering); Periodicals; Electronic journals; 620.112
• DOI: 10.1016/j.engfailanal.2017.07.003
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1350-6307

Abstract

Abstract: Derailments of trains often occur due to the wheel-rail contact failure caused by the impact of the trains with road vehicles at road-rail crossings. Frontal collisions of passenger trains onto stuck road vehicles occur frequently at such road-rail crossings even where active warning systems are installed. Such collisions are often fatal and cause significant damages to vehicles and the infrastructure especially when they incur derailments. Innovations in passive railway infrastructure designs for mitigating the severity of collision induced derailments are rare. This paper presents a formulation for a passive road-rail crossing involving stiffened edges of the raised road pavement to minimise the risk of failure of wheel–rail contact using a nonlinear three-dimensional multibody dynamics model. Severe derailment scenarios of trains passing through the passive and normal road-rail crossings have been analysed and presented. The innovative design of the road-rail crossing with passive track structure presented in the paper is shown to reduce the failure of the wheel-rail contact and hence the train-truck frontal collision derailment potential. Highlights: Wheel-Rail contact failure is the root cause of derailments. Wheel-Rail contact failure under frontal train-stuck truck collisions simulated A novel road-rail crossing to minimise wheel-rail contact failure is presented. The new design significantly reduces the derailment risk. Effects of train speed, truck mass and impact angle to derailment risk presented