Research on wheel wear of the light rail transit based on a modified semi-Hertzian contact model

PurposeWhile the normal wheel-rail contact model cannot be accurately used for light rail transit (LRT) wheel wear analysis with large wheelset lateral displacement and wheelset yaw angle, a modified semi-Hertzian contact model (MSHM) is proposed in the paper. Design/methodology/approachMSHM was first proposed to consider the wheelset motion with the lateral displacement and the yaw angle. Then, a dynamic model of an LRT was established and the influence of some key factors on wheel wear is analyzed. At last, after operating for a certain mileage, the predicted wheel wear is compared with the tested wheel wear. FindingsCompared with the tested wheel wear, the predicted wheel wear shows a good agreement with the measured result, verifying the accuracy of MSHM. Originality/valueConsidering larger wheelset lateral displacement and yaw angle, MSHM can be used to calculate the wheel wear of the LRT with high accuracy.