A study into crack growth in a railway wheel under thermal stop brake loading spectrum

This paper provides a method for solving thermal fatigue crack growth in the rail wheel under stop braking spectrum. The analysis was performed in three stages. In the first stage, a finite element model of the rail wheel is used for all braking applications. For each application, a non-linear thermal stress analysis is performed. The second stage of the sequential analysis is carried out to calculate the stress intensity factor of thermal cracks, by using a semi-analytical solution technique that involves the use of an analytical solution combined with a numerical algorithm to assess fracture strength. In the third stage, a generalised Frost–Dugdale approach has been used to modelling thermal fatigue crack growth.

► This paper provides a method for solving thermal fatigue crack growth in the rail wheel under stop braking spectrum. ► A semi-analytical approach that utilises the stress field obtained from the uncracked finite element model. ► As the crack is not modelled explicitly a coarser mesh can be used thereby improving analysis time.