Limits and Potentials of Wedge Tests for the Validation of Railway Vehicle Dynamics Models

Abstract

Validation of simulation models is crucial for a reliable, cost- and time-efficient development of railway vehicles. In this paper an approach to validate overall railway vehicle dynamics models by means of wedge tests is presented. The execution, the analysis and the results produced through wedge tests of a railway vehicle in real world as well as by means of multibody system simulations is discussed. A special emphasis is placed on the Ibrahim Time Domain Method, which is a comprehensive method to identify the vibration characteristics of dynamical systems. It is shown that wedge tests in real world and in simulation in combination with the analysis with the Ibrahim Time Domain method enable an identification of a high number of rigid body and structural eigenmodes of railway vehicles, not only eigenfrequencies, but also eigenvectors and damping factors as well.