On deterministic and stochastic simulation of wheel and rail profile wear process

In the paper the formerly elaborated simulation method for determining the wear propagation on the wheel-tread and flange is extended for the case of combined wheel/rail wear processes. In the simulation method the straight and curved track sections are treated distinctly taken into consideration a non-linear vehicle model moving on the track sections belonging to a specified network. The material removal is considered to be proportional to the dissipated energy and the specific normal traction distribution on the actual common contact patches. Also the frequency of contact is involved into the analysis characterising actual railway operation. As a result of the simulation procedure both the magnitude of the rail wear and its distribution along the track (right and left rail distinctly), as well as the wheel wear (right and left wheels distinctly) can be determined for the considered railway system. In the analysis also the stochastic lateral rail irregularities are taken into consideration. It will be shown how it is possible to extend the combined wheel/rail simulation procedure for the case of semi-Markovian stochastic operation conditions of the vehicles on a topologically specified railway network.