Open AccessDeterministic fatigue crack-growth simulations for a railway axle by Dual Boundary Element Method
Author(s) -
Venanzio Giannella,
Raffaele Sepe,
Gian Michele,
Roberto Esposito
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
iop conference series. materials science and engineering
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 1757-899X
pISSN - 1757-8981
DOI - 10.1088/1757-899x/1038/1/012080
Subject(s) - axle , structural engineering , boundary element method , nondestructive testing , residual stress , service life , finite element method , residual , fracture mechanics , dual (grammatical number) , boundary (topology) , stress intensity factor , engineering , materials science , computer science , mechanical engineering , composite material , mathematics , medicine , art , mathematical analysis , literature , algorithm , radiology
The maintenance of railway axles requires an optimization of their inspection intervals in order to reduce costs. Such components can endure more than 30 years of service life and are subjected to scheduled Non Destructive Testing (NDT) inspections. It is therefore important to assess the influence of the severe in-service loads on the propagation of cracks in the axles. This manuscript reports deterministic fracture calculations, for the simulation of cracks propagating through a railway axle, by the Dual Boundary Element Method. Once Stress Intensity Factors along the crack front are obtained, the residual fatigue life estimates were calculated through a user made spreadsheet, taking into account the complex loading conditions of the axles. The presented results support the application of the crack propagation simulation for the determination of axle NDT intervals under different loading conditions.