Modeling and simulation of railway bogie structural vibrations

The method of multibody systems including flexible bodies is applied to a railway bogie of the German high-speed train ICE. The flexible elements like the bogie frame are characterized by shape integrals which are evaluated prior to time integration to improve computational efficiency. The eigenbehavior of the railway bogie with a flexible bogie frame, rigid wheelsets and a rigid car body is analyzed in detail. An overview is given how the equations describing the bogie dynamics are derived. The representation of track irregularities by power spectral density functions is discussed and compared with measurement data. The structural vibrations of the railway bogie are primarily excited by the tracks. These forced vibrations resulting in stress and fatigue of the bogie frame are investigated by simulations.