Slip of wheels on rails: The root cause for rail undulant wear

In this paper, a comprehensive field investigation was carried out into rail corrugations of China's metro lines and railway main-lines. The occurrence rate of rail corrugation, which is defined as the accumulated length of corrugated rails divided by the total length of the investigated line, is about 11.94% for metro lines, or 2.73% for railway main-lines. In terms of the viewpoint of the friction-induced vibration inducing rail corrugation, the authors analyzed the reason to cause the difference in the occurrence rate of rail corrugation between the metro lines and railway main-lines. The slip of wheels on rails is proposed as the root cause for rail corrugation. Without the wheel/rail slip, no corrugation occurs. Model predictions of rail corrugation were performed on the sharply curved tracks, mildly curved tracks and tangential tracks. Prediction results validated the conclusion. Finally, a fast prediction method for rail corrugation was proposed.

Automated summary

This paper conducts a comprehensive field investigation into rail corrugations of China's metro lines and railway main-lines. The occurrence rate of rail corrugation is found to be 11.94% for metro lines and 2.73% for railway main-lines. The slip of wheels on rails is identified as the root cause for rail corrugation. Model predictions and a fast prediction method for rail corrugation are proposed.