Influence of creep force modelling on the non-linear stability of a rail vehicle on tangent and curved tracks

Past works have shown that the application of the non-Hertzian wheel/rail contact in the multibody system simulation may produce non-negligible differences in the results compared to the results obtained using the classical Hertzian approach. As a continuation of this research line, the running stability of a passenger rail vehicle running on tangent and curved tracks has been investigated considering the wheel/rail creep force being determined using Hertzian and non-Hertzian approaches, respectively. The results show that the creep force modelling has varied levels of influence on the estimation of the stability of a rail vehicle on both tangent and curved tracks depending on the non-ellipticity of the contact. The non-Hertzian model is recommended to be used for such kind of applications as the traditional Hertzian approach may misestimate the dynamics behaviour of the vehicle under certain circumstances.