New support roller profile design for railway wheel re-profiling process by under-floor lathes with a single cutting tool Articles uri icon

publication date

  • January 2022

start page

  • 1

end page

  • 13

issue

  • 1

volume

  • 12

International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)

  • 2045-2322

abstract

  • The wheel re-profiling is an important part of railway wheelset maintenance. Researchers and railway
    operators have been very concerned about how to minimize the loss of time during wheel re-profiling
    without decreasing safety. Avoiding wheelset disassembly means considerable time savings, while
    reducing wheel damage during operation. Underfloor wheel lathes are the most appropriate tool to
    achieve this double objective, and therefore the most used nowadays. Multi-cut tool lathes have the
    disadvantage of being extremely expensive. On the other hand, with single tool lathes, re-profiling
    is not smooth or safe enough when current convex profile support rollers are used. It is well known
    by the companies that during reprofiling the wheel suffers impacts/damaged. In this article, a
    methodology to optimize the profile of the support rollers used in underfloor single tool lathes for
    railway wheel re-profiling is proposed. This novel profile design will minimize damage and increase the
    safety of such lathes, since it proposes a greater smoothness in the process. Simulations of re-profiling
    process have been carried out by the finite element method showing that the designed roller profile
    reduces drastically the impact/damage during the operation. The impact generated between the
    re-profiling wheel and the rollers is avoided. Profile-optimized support rollers have been used in a real
    underfloor wheel lathe, showing good results.

subjects

  • Mechanical Engineering