Optimisation of railway crossing geometry considering a set of representative wheel profiles

Other conference contribution, 2013

A parameter study and grid search optimisation is performed on a parameterised crossing geometry. Crossing designs are evaluated with respect to the maximum Hertzian wheel‒rail contact pressure recorded during simulated freight traffic. Each crossing design is evaluated by running five simulation runs in each traffic direction (facing and trailing moves of the through route) with different combinations of wheel profile and friction coefficient. The sensitivity of nine design variables is estimated using regression analysis on the damage estimates for the different crossing designs. Two different categories of design variables are investigated: parameters related to the cross-sectional rail profiles of the wing rail and crossing nose, and parameters controlling the longitudinal height profiles of the wing rail and crossing nose. Parameter settings are found that provide lower objectives than the nominal design, but the improvements are typically small.