INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF COMPUTER APPLICATIONS IN ENGINEERING, TECHNOLOGY AND SCIENCES (IJ-CA-ETS)

SIMULATION OF COLD PRESS FITTING OF RAILWAY WHEEL-SET BY USING PRO-E AND ANSYS
1

NITESH P. YELVE, 2ANIL NAIK, 3SHRADDHA RAMANE, 4PRITHVIRAJ DAGA, 5INDERJIT JOHAL
1 3,4,5

Assistant Professor, Fr. C R. Institute of Technology, Vashi, Navi , Mumbai, Students, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Fr. C Rodrigues Institute of Technology, Vashi, Navi Mumbai, Senior Section Engineer2, Central Railway Workshop, Matunga, Mumbai, India
1

niteshpy@yahoo.co.in,3 shaddu_s16@yahoo.co.in

ABSTRACT : The press fitting process of a railway vehicle wheel-set is still today a topic for scientific research. Many guidelines and standards have been issued on the topic, but still some important aspects have to be clarified. The entire wheel-set assembly is solely dependent on the press fit joint and if it fails during the running condition the effect would be very disastrous. So the process of press fitting should be controlled and maintained within the limits. The contact stresses between the axle and wheel, especially during the press fitting stage, are very difficult and complicated to be analyzed by calculations but still it is important to know these stresses as they depend upon the uncontrolled variations in some parameters of the press fitting process, such as the friction coefficient and the interference between the wheel bore and axle seat diameters. Hence to facilitate the ease of knowing the contact stresses being developed in the wheel-set during the press fitting process without actually conducting the process on machine; this process is attempted to simulate in ANSYS. The required model of wheel set is imported in ANSYS from Pro-E Wildfire 2.0. Validity of simulation results is checked by comparing them with the actual press fitting results on the machine. KEYWORDS: Wheel-set, Cold Press-Fitting, ANSYS, Pro/E wildfire 2.0.

1. INTRODUCTION Railways are the most efficient and effective means of land based transport system all over the world. Indian railways (IR) is one of the largest and busiest rail networks in the world, transporting 16 million passengers and more than one million tones of freight daily. The railways traverse the length and breadth of the country; the routes cover a total length of 63,140 Km. As of 2002, IR owned a total of 216,717 wagons, 39,263 coaches and 7,739 locomotives and ran a total of 14,444 trains daily, including about 8,702 passenger trains [1]. While running such a large system, lot of problems both technical and non-technical, are encountered. Railway wheel sets are one of the most important components in railway vehicles with regard to safety. Since failure in railway vehicle wheel sets can cause a disaster.The topic under consideration is the control of the process of assembling a wheel set. A wheel set basically consists of two parts; first the solid discs and second the axle. Now these solid discs have to be fitted over the axle by the process of press fitting. As we see that there is no any joint or connection done by means of either a pin or weld, the joint solely depends on the press-fit joint. The wheel-sett is prepared on

the hydraulic press fit machine and it need to be checked properly and taken care that the required amount of pressure for the joint is taken by the machine, and if not the wheel set should be rejected. It is difficult to know analytically the contact stresses developed during the press fitting process of wheel-set for varying factors such as friction coefficient and the interference, without carrying out actual press fitting operation on the machine. Hence, latest software technology is used to know these contact stresses developed before actually going for press fitting. Pro-E Wildfire 2.0 is used to model the wheelset and ANSYS is used to simulate the press fitting process. The simulation results are then compared with the actual process results on the machine to check their validity. In the following section the process of wheel-set assembly is discussed as it is important to understand this process before going for the actual analysis. 2. PROCESS OF WHEEL-SET ASSEMBLY A press fit joint represents a bond between two parts in contact and it is realized by the static friction effect that is caused by mutual pressure acting on their contact surfaces [2]. The strength of a press fit joint represents static friction force.

ISSN: 0974-3596 | October 09 March 10 | Volume 2 : Issue 1 | Page: 350

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF COMPUTER APPLICATIONS IN ENGINEERING, TECHNOLOGY AND SCIENCES (IJ-CA-ETS)

In fact this is the biggest force which can be transmitted from one to another part in contact. In case of railway vehicles the wheel-set assembly has press fit joint between the wheel and the axle, hence strength of the press fit joint directly influences safety of railway vehicles. The various steps that take place during the complete process (observed at Central Railway Workshop, Matunga, Mumbai) are discussed here. First the solid discs are made available as raw materials which are bored at the vertical boring machine. The surface finishing is specified and is attained on the boring machine. The axles are also available as raw materials which are processed on the computer numerically controlled machine. The dimensions on the axles are attained as required on the machine precisely. The various programmes for different axles are already fed in the machine. The third and the most important step is the press fitting of the solid wheel discs on the axle. This process is performed on the hydraulic press fitting machine. Proper care should be taken while loading the axle and the discs on to the machine. These small actions also affect the pressure taken during the press fitting, which is the most important aspect that are being considered for the ideal wheel-set. 3. MODELING OF WHEEL-SET Modeling is the process of creating 3 Dimensional (3D) image of a required design which resembles the actual product with help of 3D modeling tools. For the modeling of wheelset Pro-E Wildfire 2.0 is used as a 3D modeling tool [3]. This software is developed and supported by the Parametric Technology Corporation (PTC) based in USA. This is powerful software for generating solids which is the requirement of the Industry. By using Pro-E Wild Fire 2.0 of PTC, the wheel-set is modeled with the accurate dimensions as shown in Fig.3.1. In this paper, the modeling and simulation are done for the wheel-set assembly having dimensions diameter of bore of wheel = 172 mm, diameter of wheel seat of axle = 172.24 mm. The above assembly gets saved in the assembly.asm format in Pro-E, which cannot be imported in the ANSYS. Thus the Pro-E model is saved in .iges format with default coordinate system. 4. SIMULATION OF COLD PRESSFITTING OF WHEEL-SET ASSEMBLY The press fitting of railway wheel is studied with the aim of defining the mechanical and physical parameters to be adopted in order to reduce the variations occurring during the repeated press fitting and wheel removals as much as possible. To simulate the process and develop the finite element (FE) model, the factors governing the press fitting operation such as the friction coefficient and the interference between the wheel bore and axle seat diameter are defined. The obtained results can be considered as a preliminary contribution, very important to define the goals of a further extensive experimental research aiming to control the process of press fitting on the hydraulic press. The simulations are done for the different combinations of the governing parameters of the press fitting to check the validity of simulation results by comparing them with actual machine results. 4.1 Software Package Used To simulate the process of press fitting ANSYS 8.0 is used. ANSYS is a FE simulation software package developed by ANSYS Inc-USA [4]. The discipline used is structural and the analysis type is nonlinear. The 3-D solid model of the wheelset assembly is made in PRO-E and directly imported in ANSYS. To simulate the present problem contact phenomena is used and two load steps are used to set up the analysis viz. load Step 1: Interference Fit and load Step 2: Pressing of axle in disc bore using degrees of freedom (dof) displacement conditions on coupled nodes. The press fitting simulation has been subdivided in 25 steps, each of them representing a fixed position of axle with respect to the wheel. For each step, the numbers of elements being in contact are defined, by varying the models of slave (flexible) and master surfaces [5]. The imposed thrust of the hydraulic press on the wheel to fit it onto the axle has been simulated by imposing a fixed amplitude displacement to the nodes representing the hydraulic press. In the actual workshop practice, a predetermined magnitude of force is imposed on the axle through the ram of the hydraulic press during the press fitting process. The gradient of the force is monitored to record any change. 4.2 Non Linear Analysis Structural analysis which is linear in nature follows the Hooks law, F = KU, (1) where, F stands for Force and U stands for Deflection. But this law is valid upto the elastic limit of material, once the material crosses this limit, the material is set to have entered into a non-linear phase. In such problems results are obtained by adding finite number of load steps

Fig.3.1 Model of Wheel-Set in Pro/E

ISSN: 0974-3596 | October 09 March 10 | Volume 2 : Issue 1 | Page: 351

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF COMPUTER APPLICATIONS IN ENGINEERING, TECHNOLOGY AND SCIENCES (IJ-CA-ETS)

and solving each load step iteratively. ANSYS employs the Newton-Raphson approach or Arc-Length Method to solve non linear problems [6]. 4.3 Material Properties For press fitting simulation purpose, the materials of the wheel and axle have been considered as isotropic with ideal elastic-plastic behaviors which are obtained from the IRS-stdmanual [2]. Material properties for solid disc and axle are Tensile strength (ut) : 850 N/mm2 : 460 N/mm2 Yield strength (yt) % elongation : 14 to 16 % Poissons ratio ( ) : 0.3 Youngs modulus (E) : 2.05 105 N/mm2 4.4 Element Types Used The finite elements used for the FE analysis are SOLID185, TARGET170 and CONTACT174 [7] . A brief description about each of these elements is give here. 4.4.1 SOLID185 Element SOLID185 is used for the 3D modeling of solid structures. It is defined by eight nodes having three dof at each node: translations in the nodal x, y, and z directions. The element has plasticity, hyperelasticity, stress stiffening, creep, large deflection, and large strain capabilities. It also has mixed formulation capability for simulating deformations of nearly incompressible elastoplastic materials, and fully incompressible hyper elastic materials [7]. 4.4.2 TARGE170 Element TARGE170 is used to represent various 3D target surfaces for the associated contact elements. The contact elements themselves overlay the solid elements describing the boundary of a deformable body and are potentially in contact with the target surface, defined by TARGE170. For rigid target surfaces, these elements can easily model complex target shapes. For flexible targets, these elements will overlay the solid elements describing the boundary of the deformable target body [7]. The target surface can either be rigid or deformable. For modeling rigid-flexible contact, the rigid surface must be represented by a target surface. For flexible-flexible contact, one of the deformable surfaces must be overlayed by a target surface. 4.4.3 CONTA174 Element CONTA174 is used to represent contact and sliding between 3D target surfaces and a deformable surface, defined by this element. The element is applicable to 3D structural contact analyses. This element is located on the surfaces of 3D solid or shell elements with midside nodes. Contact occurs when the element surface penetrates one of the target segment elements on a specified target surface. The element is defined by eight nodes [7]. 4.5 Meshing Used The Mesh Tool is used to generate the meshed FE model. For meshing the 3D solid element Solid 185 Tetrahedra is used. Initially Automatic mesh generator is used with default minimal element edge length size of 1, due to which the whole model (wheel and axle) had 722035 elements. Because of this the software took 25 hours for solving one set of parameter combinations. Global Element Size i.e. SIZE Element edge length of 25 gave 28889 elements on whole model. The mesh is refined in the wheel seat zone where the maximum values of stress and related gradients are foreseen [6]. This refined mesh is shown in the Fig.4.1. This step reduced the solving time to approximately 5 hours.

Fig.4.1 Refined Mesh 4.6 Creating Contact Pair using Contact Wizard This is used to define the contact between the wheel bore and axle seat. This defines the surface to surface contact between two [5]. The parameters governing the press-fitting process are defined in this step and hence complete FE model of the process is developed for load step 1. 4.7 Specifying Solution Criteria Pick the face of wheel hub where it is fixed on the fixture on actual hydraulic press while pressfitting to constrain all dofs [6]. A large displacement static analysis for load step 1 is specified. For load step 2 following things are considered: 4.7.1 Hydraulic Press Operation Pressure gradually increases from 0 to (80-100) ton in 118 sec. of operation of press with total ram movement of 191 mm. Then it is suddenly brought to 0 t at once. The pressure does not increase till first 4-6 sec. Then it suddenly increases till 10-15 t. After interference is achieved pressure starts increasing gradually till the range. The distance versus load curve and time versus load curve is obtained [2]. 4.7.2 Set DOF Displacement for Axle

ISSN: 0974-3596 | October 09 March 10 | Volume 2 : Issue 1 | Page: 352

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF COMPUTER APPLICATIONS IN ENGINEERING, TECHNOLOGY AND SCIENCES (IJ-CA-ETS)

A displacement value of 191 is applied to all nodes on the back of the axle in order to observe the effects of pressing the axle in the wheel disc. Both the load steps are solved one by one. 5. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION The required results of the simulation are obtained in Post Processing stage of ANSYS. Here the interference fit stress state is determined. The nodal solutions for Von Mises stresses are found as shown in the Fig.5.1. Then intermediate contact pressure on axle and pressed-in stress state is obtained. The pressingin the Von Mises stresses induced are shown in the Fig.5.2.

Fig.5.3 Load versus Time Graph

Fig.5.1 Von Mises Stresses (Load Step 1) The graph of load versus time is obtained from the above analysis as shown in Fig,5.3 which is found to be in close agreement with the load graph obtained from the actual press fitting process.

Fig.5.2 Von Mises Stresses (Load Step 2) The experimental validation of the FE model and the simulation of press fitting presented in this paper have been performed by comparing the results of simulation with the measured data referring to actual experiments made in the workshop of the Central Railway, Matunga, Mumbai for different press-fitting assemblies with different parameters. The graph shown in Fig.5.4 shows the good agreement between the two. The graph has axial load applied for the press-fitting (in ton) on Y-axis and number of experiments taken into consideration on X-axis.

Fig.5.4 Comparison of Results 6. CONCLUSION In this paper the press-fitting process of railway vehicle wheel on its axle has been simulated by using softwares such as Pro-E and ANSYS. Although only an extensive and accurate experimental test campaign may give a reliable contribution to solve the addressed problem, in this paper a preliminary and important contribution has been given to understand the phenomenon of the press fitting (and removal) of a railway wheel on (or from) its axle. There is good agreement between the load graphs of press fitting obtained by ANSYS and on actual machine. Therefore, it is reasonable to state that a FE model can simulate fairly well the press fitting process of railway wheel on its axle. 7. REFERENCES [1] Annexure VIII, R. D. S. O. Ministry Of Railways, Indian Railways [2] IRS R -19/93 (Part 1 &2), Indian Railways [3] Pro/Engineer Wildfire 2.0 Software, PTC, USA Software ANSYS Inc. [4] ANSYS Canonsburg, PA, USA. (www.ansys.com) [5] Sham Tikoo, ANSYS Reference Guide [6] ANSYS Reference Guide, CADD Centre, India [7] ANSYS 8.0 Documentation, Nonlinear Structural Analysis, ANSYS 8.0 [8] Maintenance Manual for BG coaches of ICF design, Indian Railways, Annexure AAxle Report [9] Pro/Engineer Reference Guide, CADD Centre, India

ISSN: 0974-3596 | October 09 March 10 | Volume 2 : Issue 1 | Page: 353