Ain Shams Engineering Journal xxx (2017) xxxxxx

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Ain Shams Engineering Journal

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Civil Engineering

Prediction of fatigue crack initiation life in railheads using finite element

analysis
H.M. El-sayed a,, M. Lotfy b, H.N. El-din Zohny c, H.S. Riad c
a
Faculty of Engineering, Suez Canal University, Egypt
b
Faculty of Engineering, British University in Egypt, Egypt
c
Faculty of Engineering, Ain Shams University, Egypt

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The current study introduced a numerical procedure to study fatigue crack initiation life in railheads. It
Received 13 February 2017 was mainly performed by a three-dimensional (3D) explicit finite element (FE) model that accounts for
Revised 1 May 2017 bending stresses due to global dynamic response of railway track and local stresses due to wheel-rail con-
Accepted 6 June 2017
tact loads. The results obtained from FE analysis were combined with the critical plane approach and
Available online xxxx
multiaxial low cyclic fatigue mode to predict crack orientation and fatigue crack initiation life. This model
was applied to a case study in the first line of Greater Cairo Underground Metro (GCUM) in Egypt. The
Keywords:
advantages of the proposed model are that it can represent realistic wheel-rail contact geometry and
Rolling contact fatigue
Crack initiation
non-linearity of material behavior together with dynamic response and cyclic loading. A good agreement
Wheel-rail contact of cracks orientations and locations of the field observations with the predicted ones based on FE results
Critical plane approach was achieved.
2017 Ain Shams University. Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under
the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

1. Introduction
In general, the wheel-rail contact phenomenon generates stres-
ses in the contacting bodies that are among the fiercest to be found
in engineering applications. This will cause a predilection for mate-
rial deterioration depending on operation conditions. Initially,
wear and plastic flow were considered as the major cause of fail-
ure. However, with improved wheel-rail profiles, more wear resis-
tance materials, and increased lubrication, etc., these failure modes
were suppressed. Instead rolling contact fatigue (RCF) has
increased. This phenomenon is known to take place in most of
the rail steel materials commonly in use today.
Head checks, squats, and shelling are all names for RCF defects.
These defects may result in spalling which affect ride comfort, and
noise emission as well as dynamic load for both rolling stock and
track. However, for reasons still not clearly understood, isolated
Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: hosam.mohamed_2014@yahoo.com (H.M. El-sayed), mo-
hamed.lotfy@bue.edu.eg (M. Lotfy), hnzohny@yahoo.com (H.N. El-din Zohny),
hanysobhyr@yahoo.com (H.S. Riad).
Peer review under responsibility of Ain Shams University.
Production and hosting by Elsevier
cracks may branch downwards in the rail and, if not detected, brit-
tle fracture may take place which in some cases may cause derail-
ment, see Zerbst et al. [1]. Fracture at one crack may also advance
stress in the nearby rail increasing the risk of further fractures. To
get an impression of the magnitude of RCF problem, several severe
rail accidents have been reported in the world due to unexpected
catastrophic rail failure caused by RCF. One of these accidents is
derailment of Hatfield train in United Kingdom (2000). In European
Union, rail problems cost 2 billion Euros annually, Cannon et al. [2],
and North American Railroads spent $600 million per year for the
replacement of the deteriorated rails in the early 1980s, Tyfour
et al. [3].
This problem, at its initial stage, can be effectively controlled by
grinding the rail surface to remove the plastically deformed layer
at which cracks are likely to be initiated and/or to re-profile rail-
head transversely, that is can reduce contact stresses and improve
steering; see Grassie [4] and Zhi et al. [5]. However, for deeply
developed cracks, it becomes insufficient as the grinding cost will
be too high and the remaining railhead will be too thin. In this case
expensive rail replacement is often inevitable. Therefore, it is safer
and more economically efficient to take preventive rather than cor-
rective maintenance action. This requires understanding the mech-
anism of the initiation of RCF defects which is the main goal of this
investigation.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.asej.2017.06.003
2090-4479/ 2017 Ain Shams University. Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V.
This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

Please cite this article in press as: El-sayed HM et al. Prediction of fatigue crack initiation life in railheads using finite element analysis. Ain Shams Eng J
(2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.asej.2017.06.003
2 H.M. El-sayed et al. / Ain Shams Engineering Journal xxx (2017) xxxxxx

Nomenclature

A major axis of the contact patch in rolling direction (mm) Dyr lateral displacement of the contact point from the rail
B minor axis of the contact patch in lateral direction (mm) center line (mm)
b fatigue strength exponent Dc shear strain range
c fatigue ductility exponent De normal strain range
Ck kinematic hardening modulus (MPa) Ds shear stress range (MPa)
d depth below the railhead surface (mm) e0f tensile fatigue ductility coefficient
E elastic modulus (MPa)
ep equivalent plastic strain
FP fatigue parameter (MPa)
e_p equivalent plastic strain rate
G shear modulus (MPa) h; u orientation of the crack plane (deg)
IG inner gauge of the wheelset (mm) l coefficient of friction
J constant in multiaxial fatigue model q mass density (kg/m3)
Nf fatigue life to crack initiation (cycles) r stress tensor (MPa)
P0 maximum contact pressure (MPa) rmax maximum normal stress (MPa)
Q1 isotropic hardening modulus (MPa) r0 yield stress (size of yield stress in the stress space)
RI rail inclination angle (deg) (MPa)
R isotropic hardening parameter rj0 initial yield stress at zero plastic strain (MPa)
TG standard track gauge (mm) r0f tensile fatigue strength coefficient (MPa)
Wr nominal wheel radius for motor coach (mm) m Poissons ratio
X, Y, Z global coordinate system s frictional stress (MPa)
a back stress tensor which describes the translation of slim limiting frictional stress (MPa)
yield surface in the stress space (MPa) s0f shear fatigue strength coefficient (MPa)
ck kinematic hardening parameter hi MacCauley bracket, i.e. hXi 0:5jXj X
c0f shear fatigue ductility coefficient

Few researches have been undertaken focusing on cracks initi-
ation life due to RCF. Ringsberg et al. [6] performed a quasi-static
tool for the analysis of RCF in railheads. This tool has the ability
to evaluate residual stresses, plastic strains, crack orientations,
depth of crack below the rail surface and fatigue life to crack initi-
ation owing to global track bending and local material response
due to wheel-rail contact forces in straight track. However, one
drawback of this model is that the contact pressure distribution
was modeled according to the Hertzian theory which is thoroughly
reported in Johnson [7]. The Hertzian theory assumes elastic, iso-
topic, and homogeneous material behavior and there is no plastic
deformation at the contact zone. Therefore, the contact conditions
were not updated when plastic deformation occurred under
repeated wheel passages. Likewise, Hertzian theory cannot repre-
sent real wheel-rail contact. This tool was extended by Ringsberg
and Josefson [8] to include curved tracks considering a more
advanced material model. This tool was applied to newly manufac-
tured rails using Hertzian theory, and to rails that have been in ser-
vice for some times (16 months) using non-Hertzian contact load
distribution. A set of twin desk tests were employed to validate
the fatigue evaluation strategy. The results revealed that newly
manufactured rails are severally damage in comparison with rela-
tively old ones. Another improvement for Ringsberg model was
performed by Akama [9] by including real geometry of wheel-rail
contact, but the global track response was neglected. Furthermore,
Sandstrm and Ekberg [10] developed 3D elastic-plastic quasi-
static FE simulations to investigate plastic deformation and fatigue
damage in railhead close the insulated rail joints (IRJs). Their FE
model consists of a part of the wheel and the rail with insulating
material but the wheel conicity, the rail inclination and the
dynamic track response were ignored in their simulations. Due to
restrictions of the computational time, only six wheel passages
were applied in their analyses. However, in order to model
wheel-rail contact more realistically, the dynamic contact behavior
should be considered. Naeimi et al. [11] performed an explicit 3D
FE model to estimate the angles of squat cracks in rails over one
wheel passage. Furthermore, Xin et al. [12] presented a transient
FE model to study stress and strain distributions as well as to pre-
dict crack initiation life at the crossing. In spite of all these studies,
the exact mechanism of fatigue initiation life is, up till now, not
fully understood and need further researches.
In the current study, therefore, a numerical procedure was pre-
sented to further investigate stresses, plastic strains, and orienta-
tions of crack plane as well as to predict fatigue crack initiation
life in the railhead. The proposed model attempted to overcome
the drawbacks of the previous studies. It is capable of combining
realistic wheel-rail contact geometry and non-linear material
behavior together with global track response over repeated loading
cycles. The proposed procedure presented in this investigation is
briefly described in Fig. 1. The fatigue analysis procedure was per-
formed in the following consequence:
1. The global dynamic FE model was developed to obtain displace-
ments to be the boundary condition of the second FE analysis,
which is called submodel.
2. The second FE model was performed. This model is a part of the
global FE model where repeated wheel passages were applied
and an advanced material behavior was assigned. This model
was connected to the global FE model using time dependent
boundary condition.
3. Using the stress-strain history obtained from submodel for the
most critical points, the crack plane was identified by using a
critical plane approach accompanied with a theoretical model
for low cyclic fatigue (LCF) crack initiation. Having identified
the crack plane, the fatigue life of crack initiation can be easily
evaluated.
4. The predicted results were compared with field observations to
validate the performed methodology.
The influence of global bending and track discontinuity at the
IRJs on local material response was also investigated in the present
study.
2. Investigation scope
The simulation case was taken from the first line of GCUM in
Egypt. Fig. 2 shows a schematic drawing of wheel and rail profiles
at contact zone. The standard track gauge (TG) of 1435 mm is used,

Please cite this article in press as: El-sayed HM et al. Prediction of fatigue crack initiation life in railheads using finite element analysis. Ain Shams Eng J
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global model in which one wheel is allowed to roll on a finite

Global dynamic Total track profile length of the track. The second one is called submodel using sub-
FE model Elastic behavior
modeling technique which enable of studying a local part of a
model with refined mesh; more details about this technique can
be found in [15]. This model is utilized here to study local distribu-
tions of stresses and strains at the contact region more precisely.
Displacements
The two FE models were connected together using time dependent
boundary condition. The coordinate directions used in this study
are: X-axis is the lateral direction, Y-axis is the vertical direction,
and Z-axis is the longitudinal direction (rolling direction), as
Only a part of wheel-rail geometry
Submodel FE shown in Fig. 3.
Elastic-plastic behavior
model
Repeated wheel passages
3.1. The global model

The global model consists of the wheel, rail, rail pad, strands
Stress-strain response
(sleeper reinforcement) embedded into sleeper, ballast, and sub-
under cyclic loading
grade. The main target of this analysis is to study dynamic bending
effect of the rail and to obtain displacements to be the boundary
condition in submodel analysis. The global model consists of 32
sleepers, distance between sleepers = 60 cm [14], summing to
Critical plane and
fatigue life evaluation 18.6 m of track. This length was considered to be sufficient to cal-
culate the global dynamic response of the track accurately. The
track is straight and horizontal. Therefore, symmetry in loading
If good agreement between the two rails was assumed and, hence, only one side of
Comparison with Reliable fatigue the track was modeled using symmetry boundary condition. The
filed observations analysis procedure rail was connected with rail pad and supporting sleeper in the ver-
tical and lateral directions. Moreover, the depth of the subgrade
layer was assumed to be one meter below the ballast layer, the
Fig. 1. Flow chart of the rail fatigue analysis procedure.
base of the model was restricted from any displacement, and the
model was constrained in X-Y plane at the two ends to prevent
135 longitudinal displacement in the rolling direction. Schematic of
Wheel 105 the suggested global track system and the wheel in the FE model
70 is shown in Fig. 3. The solution process in this model consists of
35.7 four steps that can be summarized as follows:
Wr=510

32.5 IG/2=679.5
45 1. Initial step: Boundary conditions were applied to the model
and the Strands were preloaded as initial state of stress. The
magnitude of the preloading stress was taken as 1400 MPa.
10
3:20

1:20

R 14.05
29

R 36 2. First step: The gravity load was applied to the track system, the
70 R 15
20 wheel load was assigned to the wheel and the contact was
21.35 3.8 established between the wheel and the rail, between the rail
R300

14
R80

RI 1:20

TG/2=717.5 and the rail pad, between the rail pad and the sleeper and
1:20

All Dimensions in mm between the sleeper and the ballast layer.

Rail R 13
Fig. 2. Schematic drawing of wheel-rail profiles at contact zone, [14].
instead of 1000 mm which commonly used in metro lines, and the
inner gauge (IG) of the wheelset is 1359 mm. The axle load of
22 ton in case of exceptional over load condition (13 passenger/
m2) for motor coach was chosen according to Mohsen [13]. The
nominal wheel radius (Wr) for motor coach is 510 mm and its
grade is R7 wheel steel material. The rail profile is UIC54 with
grade 900 A rail steel material mounted with an inclination (RI)
inwards of 1:20 (2.86). The designed velocity at the test site is
100 km/hr. The rail is fastened to the sleeper with K type fastening,
with rail pad between the rail and the sleeper with 5 mm thick-
ness. The sleeper is 239 kg concrete monoblock sleeper with spac-
ing 60 cm. More details of these track properties can be found in
[14].
3. The FE model
In order to combine global response of track with local response
due to wheel-rail contact loads, two FE models were developed
using FE commercial software ABAQUS. The first model is called
3. Second step: The wheel was allowed to roll along the rail with a
distance 120 mm by applying a translational and angular veloc-
ity equal 100 km/hr, and 54.5 rad/sec respectively.
4. Third step: The load was removed from the wheel.
The applied loads and boundary conditions of the wheel part
were applied at the reference node, this node is located at the cen-
ter of the wheel and connected with the inside surface of the wheel
by using coupling constraint.
3.2. The submodel
Heva [16] concluded that the depth of plastic zone in the rail-
head is about 12 mm after the first cycle. Consequently, only a lim-
ited partition of the rail is required for modeling wheel-rail contact
efficiently. Furthermore, modeling of a complete wheel is not nec-
essary, only a small area at the contact zone is sufficient. Therefore,
in the present study only a small partition of wheel-rail was con-
sidered. The suggested FE model of wheel-rail in submodel is
shown in Fig. 4. The length and the height of the rail part are
140 mm and 70 mm respectively. The width and thickness of the
wheel part are 50 mm and 25 mm respectively with a central angle
of 17 degrees, arc length = 151.32 mm. Both the wheel part and the

Please cite this article in press as: El-sayed HM et al. Prediction of fatigue crack initiation life in railheads using finite element analysis. Ain Shams Eng J
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1020mm
300 210

717.5mm
1000mm

1200mm
1750mm
Y 3000mm
Z X

(a) (b)
Fig. 3. Description of railway track system: (a) cross section of railway track components and wheel; (b) the suggested global track system in the FE model. Dimensions of
wheel, rail, rail pad, sleeper and ballast were taken from [14]; whereas dimensions of subgrade layer were assumed.

Upper wheel part

Lower wheel part

151.32mm
20mm

50mm
5mm

15mm 120mm
55mm
140mm
Lower rail part
Fig. 4. The suggested FE model of wheel-rail in submodel.
rail part were divided into two parts: the upper part and the lower
part, connected with each other using tie constrain with a view to
assign fine mesh and elastic-plastic material behavior for the upper
rail part with 15 mm thickness, and the lower wheel part with 5
mm thickness.
In submodel analysis, fifteenth wheel passages were applied in
the ABAQUS/Explicit environment. Each cycle consists of four steps
as follows:
1. First step: The load was applied to the wheel and wheel-rail
contact was established.
2. Second step: The wheel was allowed to rotate along the rail
with a specified distance by applying the same translational
and rotational speed used in the global FE model.
3. Third step: The load was removed from the wheel.
4. Fourth step: The wheel and the rail were allowed to return to
their initial position.
3.3. The material model
The material response at the wheel-rail contact region over cyc-
lic loading may be any one of the four cases illustrated in Fig. 5
depending on, for example, the character and the intensity of the
applied contact loads, the material hardening, and the variation
of contact conditions due to wear and/or plastic deformation. An
Fig. 5. Illustration of different material responses to cyclic loading: (a) perfectly
elastic; (b) elastic shakedown; (c) plastic shakedown; (d) ratchetting, Ringsberg
[19].
Upper rail part
inclusive description of these types can be found in Fouvry et al.
[17] and Johnson [18]. Case (a), perfectly elastic response, takes
place if the contact load is sufficiently low, and the behavior of
the material is purely elastic and reversible. This response is rare
to occur in both wheel-rail materials at the contact zone. If the
applied contact load is higher than the elastic limit, the plastic
deformation takes place initially. However, after some cycles, the
residual stresses and plastic hardening may shakedown the mate-
rial response to the elastic state, this behavior is commonly known
as shakedown or elastic shakedown, case (b). If the contact
load is more severe than the elastic shakedown limit, the plastic
deformation occurs after each cycle until the cyclic stress-strain
curve stabilized with zero net plastic deformation, this behavior
is called plastic shakedown, case (c); whilst in case (d) the plastic
strain increments in each load cycle and the plastic deformation
accumulates until the material ductility is exhausted, the state is
referred to as ratchetting.
To accurately capture material degradation under repeated
wheel passages, an appropriate constitutive model is required. In
the current study, Armstrong-Frederick (AF) plastic model [20]
with non-linear kinematic hardening rule was chosen to describe
the lower part of wheel material. This rule was adopted in Saint
et al. [21] to model the wheel material; while the upper part of rail
material was modeled by using Chaboche and Lemaitre model [22]
which combines non-linear isotropic and kinematic hardening
laws. This elastic-plastic material model was applied to RCF loads
in Ringsberg et al. [6], and the obtained results assessed the capac-
ity of this model to simulate material ratchetting response with
decaying ratchetting rate. However, Bari and Hassan [23] found
that the Chaboche model can predict uniaxial ratchetting
responses quite well, but it over predicts the biaxial and multiaxial

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ratchetting responses. This motivated many researchers to develop Table 1

more advanced constitutive models for improving ratchetting sim- Material properties for wheel, rail, rail pad, sleeper, strands, ballast, and subgrade.

ulation under multiaxial loading conditions with decaying ratchet- Part Parameter Unit Value
ting rate, such as Ohno-Wang model, McDowell model, Jiang- Wheel (grade R7T) q kg/m 3
7850
Sehitoglu model, Bari-Hassan model, and Abdel Karim-Ohno E MPa 205,000
model, etc. Many of these models were compared by Bari and Has- m 0.3
san [23,24] against a set of uniaxial and biaxial experiments that ry MPa 316
c 401
had ratchetting response. It was found that these models give
C MPa 137,000
slight better accuracy comparing to Chaboche model. However,
Rail (grade 900 A) q kg/m3 7800
these models are more complex and include a large number of
E MPa 206,000
material parameters that available only for limited numbers of m 0.28
metals and require more refined experiments to be determined. ry MPa 379
Therefore, it was considered that AF model and Chaboche and c1 , c2 , c3 55, 600, 2000
Lemaitre model are suitable in the present study to model C1 , C2 , C3 MPa 24,750, 60,000, 200,000
R 500
wheel-rail material with reasonable accuracy. The non-linear iso- Q1 MPa 189
tropic and kinematic hardening rules in the Chaboche and Lemaitre r0f MPa 936
model can be described as follows: e0f % 10.6
s0f MPa 468
1
a_k C k r  a
e_p  ck ak
e_p ; k 1; 2; 3 1 c0f % 15.45
r0 J 0.2
b 0.089
0.559
r0 r0 Q 1 1  eR
e c
p
2
Rail pad q kg/m3 950
where a is the back stress tensor which describes the translation of E MPa 800
m 0.46
yield surface in the stress space; r is the stress tensor;
e_p is the
equivalent plastic strain rate;
ep is the equivalent plastic strain; Sleeper q kg/m3 2300
E MPa 36,000
r0 is the yield stress (size of yield stress in the stress space); r0 is m 0.3
the initial yield stress at zero plastic strain; C k , ck , Q 1 , R are material
Strands q kg/m3 7800
parameters that must be calibrated from uniaxial cyclic test data. E MPa 200,000
The material within the volume of the lower part of the rail, m 0.3
upper part of the wheel, and all the material in the global model Ballast q kg/m3 1800
were simulated using linear-elastic material model as they are of E MPa 170
less interest in the present study, and the present simulations ver- m 0.3
ified that the load carried by these parts is low. The material Subgrade q kg/m3 1600
parameters for elastic behavior, isotopic hardening, and kinematic E MPa 30
hardening are listed in Table 1. m 0.25

3.4. Wheel-rail contact
In ABAQUS, wheel-rail contact was defined by using surface-to-
surface discretization method. This approach consists of a master
surface and a slave surface. The wheel tread was defined as a
slave contact surface and the railhead was modeled as a master
contact surface. This approach was chosen to minimize the pene-
tration of the master nodes into the slave surface during analysis,
to increase contact stress accuracy, and to reduce sensitivity with
respect to choice of master and slave surfaces [15]. A penalty fric-
tion formulation method was applied to the model to enforce the
contact constraints. Finite sliding option was allowed during anal-
ysis and the coefficient of friction between the wheel and rail was
selected as 0.35 which simulates lubricated condition according to
Harrison et al. [29]. Coulombs friction law described in Eq. (3) was
applied to describe frictional rolling contact.
The wheel steel material parameters were taken from [14] and Saint et al. [21];
while those of the rail steel material were taken from [14], Schleinzer and Fischer
[25] and Ringsberg et al. [26]; whereas the material parameters for rail pad, sleeper,
ballast, and subgrade were taken from Abdu [27]. Material parameters for strands
were taken from Li [28].
1. Contact pair 1: between the bottom surface of the rail and the
top surface of the rail pad.
2. Contact pair 2: between the bottom surface of the rail pad and
the top surface of the sleeper.
3. Contact pair 3: between the bottom surface of the sleeper and
the top surface of the ballast layer.
The coefficients of friction of the contact pairs, instead of wheel-
rail contact, used in the present model were obtained from [30].

slim lP0 ; ksk 6 slim 3 4. Calculation of the fatigue life to crack initiation

where P 0 is the maximum contact pressure; l is the friction coeffi-
cient; slim is the limiting frictional stress; s is the frictional stress.
For contact position, it was considered that a train running over
a straight track. Therefore, lateral displacement, Dyr, between
nominal wheel radius and rail center line would occur as shown
in Fig. 2. In this study Dyr was chosen equal to 1 mm. Note that,
negative sign means that contact point is moved to the outer rail
side.
In additional to wheel-rail contact, three contact pairs were cre-
ated in the FE model as follows:
In wheel-rail contact problem, the rail is suffered from a non-
proportional multiaxial stress state which causes variation of prin-
cipal stress and strain directions during wheel passage. Therefore,
the critical plane approach was proposed here together with mul-
tiaxial low cyclic fatigue (LCF) model developed by Jiang and Sehi-
toglu [31]. Chen et al. [32] compared a set of uniaxial and
multiaxial fatigue models against a number of multiaxial non-
proportional LCF experiments, and they found that such a model
gave the best agreement with experiments. Here, both the normal
and shear components of stress and strain contribute to the fatigue

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parameter (FP) and hence damage of the material based on the fol-
lowing formula:
De
FP hrmax i J Ds Dc
2
where hi is the MacCauley bracket, i.e. hXi = 0.5 (jXj + X); rmax is the
maximum normal stress; De is the normal strain range; Dc is the
shear strain range; Ds is the shear stress range; J is constant which
is a load and material dependent and should be obtained from ten-
sion/torsion tests. The material plane with the largest fatigue
parameter (FPmax) is called critical plane (crack plane).
For an arbitrary stress-strain history of the point of the interest,
the critical plane cannot be known a priori. Therefore, FP max and the
corresponding critical plane were obtained in this investigation by
computing the transformation matrices for a given set of angles at
the material point. After the critical plane has been identified, the
crack initiation life (N f ) can then be evaluated on the critical plane
using Eq. (5). This equation consists of two forms: formula that
includes shear form is adopted to evaluate N f if shear cracking gov-
erns the fatigue life. However for material that exhibits tensile
cracking, tensile form should be used.
8 02
> the lowest contact pressure (1320 MPa) was obtained with
< rf 2N f 2b r0 e0 2Nf bc
E f f
FP max
>
: sf 2N 2b s0 c0 2N bc
0 2
f f
G f f
where r0f , e0f , s0f , c0f , b and c are the material parameters. Although
the rail profile in this study is UIC54 with a grade 900 A rail steel
material, fatigue parameters utilized in Eq. (5) were considered to
be equivalent to British Standard BS11 normal grade steel due to
lack of documentation and test data for UIC grade 900 A and the dif-
ference of chemical and mechanical properties between the two rail
steel materials is minor. This assumption was also applied in other
studies; for example Ringsberg et al. [6,8] and Wickramasinghe
[33]. The mechanical properties used in fatigue calculations are pre-
sented in Table 1.
5. Meshing
In explicit analysis the solution time is proportional to the num-
ber of nodes and roughly inversely proportional to the smallest ele-
ment size [15]. Thus, a certain strategy was applied to optimize the
accuracy and computational time of the model.
In the global model, fine mesh is only limited to wheel-rail at
contact region; whilst coarse mesh was assigned to other parts of
the global model. Fully integrated eight-node linear brick (C3D8)
elements were applied for all elements instead of strands that were
modeled by two-node linear 3D truss (T3D2) elements. The total
number of elements and nodes in the global model are 555,323,
and 673,384 respectively.
In submodel, high level of accuracy needs to be obtained at the
railhead zone where several stresses and strains are expected with
reasonable computational time. Consequently, a mesh sensitivity
analysis was performed to determine the optimum mesh size.
Mesh refinement was implemented only at the upper rail part
and the lower wheel part, although the stresses of the wheel part
are not of interest in the current study, but the mesh size of the
wheel will influence the stresses and strains obtained at the rail-
head. The element size in the lower part of the rail and the upper
part of the wheel remains the same. At the stage of mesh conver-
gence, the wheel and rail materials were deemed to behave elasti-
cally in the FE analysis and the global bending was neglected. The
relation between the maximum contact pressure, number of ele-
ments, and required time to complete the analysis for each trial
is illustrated in Fig. 6. Fig. 6 indicated that the highest contact pres-
sure (1539 MPa) was obtained with 0.4  0.4 mm mesh, whereas
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1550 140
120
Mesh 0.4 x 0.4
4 1500
Peak contact pressure (MPa)
100
Time (hr)
1450
80
60
1400
Contact pressure
40
Mesh 2.0 x 2.0
Time
1350
20
1300 0
0 500000 1000000 1500000 2000000
Number of elements
Fig. 6. The relation between peak contact pressure, number of elements, and
required time to complete the analysis for each trial.
2.0  2.0 mm mesh, i.e. the finer the mesh was generated, the
5
higher contact pressure value would be obtained. The mesh con-
vergence was achieved with 0.8  0.8 mm mesh. Moreover, the
maximum contact pressure of the 1.2  1.2 mm mesh is reduced
by 3.26% and the computational time is reduced to about 1/5 with
respect to that of the 0.8  0.8 mm mesh. Therefore, to get accept-
able accuracy with reduction of time consumption, the 1.2  1.2
mesh was found to be adequate in the FE analysis in submodel.
6. Results & discussion
6.1. Verification of the global model
Fig. 7 points out a contour plot of global track displacement in
the vertical direction. Large displacements were obtained directly
under the wheel load; whilst the other parts of the modeled track
were not highly affected. To verify the accuracy of the global FE
model, rail displacement in the vertical direction was obtained
from the FE model and compared with analytical method based
on Zimmerman model [34] as illustrated in Fig. 8. The maximum
displacement from the FE model was 1.805 mm, whereas the max-
imum displacement obtained from Zimmerman method was 1.82
mm when the track modulus was 49.3 MPa. This value in Zimmer-
man model was adjusted to have the same values of elastic modu-
lus for materials and the same dimensions applied in the FE model
based on Zhai et al. [35] and Prakoso [36]. In both the two curves,
the vertical deflection reached its peak value under the wheel load,
and gradually decreased whenever being far from the contact
point. The difference between two models was 0.82%. It should
be noted that the distribution of displacement obtained from FE
model wasnt symmetric due to the effect of dynamic track
response that cannot be included in Zimmerman model. Hence,
the two models give a good agreement with each other.
6.2. Verification of the submodel
CONTACT program [37] that contains some of rolling contact
theories developed by Kalker [38] was proven by various studies
to be sufficient to model elastic contact problems accurately, see
for example Yan and Fischer [39]. Therefore, this program was used
to verify the accuracy of the FE model by considering elastic solu-
tions. Furthermore, in the FE model, two analyses were performed,
which are quasi-static analysis based on implicit time integration
 H.M. El-sayed et al. / Ain Shams Engineering Journal xxx (2017) xxxxxx 7

Fig. 7. Displacement of the global track model in the vertical direction (UY).

1600
0.1 quasi-stac soluon
1400 CONTACT soluon

Contact pressure (MPa)

-0.3 1200
Deecon (mm)

1000
-0.7
800

-1.1 Rolling direction 600

400
-1.5 Zimmerman
FE model 200
-1.9 0
-10 -8 -6 -4 -2 0 2 4 6 8 10
-10 -8 -6 -4 -2 0 2 4 6 8 10
Distance along rolling direcon, Z(m)
Distance along rolling direcon, Z (mm)
Fig. 8. Deflection curve from FE model and Zimmerman model. The origin is placed
under the peak deflection value. Fig. 9. Contact pressure distributions along rolling direction, Z, for quasi-static
solution and CONTACT solution. The origin is placed under the peak contact
pressure value.

in ABAQUS/Standard and transient analysis using explicit algo-

rithm in ABAQUS/Explicit with the aim to verify the efficiency of
explicit algorithm applied in fatigue analysis. Comparing the on the elastic rail is included in the model due to dynamic effect;
results listed in Table 2. It can be observed that the difference while CONTACT program does not take this effect into account.
between CONTACT program and quasi-static analysis is 0.33%. In The time required to simulate the rolling of a wheel over a distance
addition, difference of major axis in rolling direction, A, between 0.12 m under the rolling speed of 100 km/h. in case of transient
two solutions is 12.97%, and difference of minor axis in lateral analysis is about half of that required in quasi-static analysis. This
direction, B, between two solutions is 19.56%. The difference is one of the benefits of explicit analysis over implicit ones.
between the two solutions comes from the mesh size. Neverthe- The influence of plastic behavior on the contact pressure distri-
less, the influence of this error on contact pressure distribution is bution is demonstrated in Fig. 10. Based on quasi-static analysis,
inconsiderable due to the vanishing of contact pressure at the con- the pressure level is sharply reduced in case of elastic-plastic anal-
tact edges as can be seen in Fig. 9; whereas the difference between ysis. This reduction is due to the increasing conformity of the two
CONTACT and transient analysis is 18.52%. This is because of the contacting bodies and reduced height of the rail surface due to
vibration of the structure excited by the rolling of the elastic wheel plastic deformation. This situation was studied by Saint et al.
[21]. The authors applied the same wheel-rail material properties
and they concluded that the plasticity reduces the maximum con-
tact pressure in comparison with elastic solution by 29.45%. In the
Table 2 present study, the maximum difference between the two solutions
Comparison of the solutions obtained by FE models and CONTACT program.
is 24.78%. Considering the difference between the two FE models in
Approach Maximum contact Contact patch wheel-rail contact position and contact geometry, it can be found
pressure (MPa) that the results between two models correlate well with each
Major axis Minor axis
A (mm) B (mm) other. Moreover, in elastic-plastic solution the contact patch
CONTACT 1210 15.7 11.02 becomes flatter at the trailing edge and wider in the lateral direc-
Quasi-static analysis 1214 18.04 13.7 tion. Also, the contact pressure distribution is almost constant at
Transient analysis 1485 24.18 17.66 the central part of contact patch, and the contact area increased
Diff. between CONTACT and 0.33% 12.97% 19.56% compared with elastic solution which also concluded by Saint
quasi-static FE model
Diff. between CONTACT and 18.51% 35.07% 37.60%
et al. [21], and Wiest et al. [40]. By comparing Fig. 10(a) with
transient FE model Fig. 10(c), it can be seen that in case of elastic-plastic solution,

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Rolling direction Rolling direction

CPRESS (MPa) CPRESS (MPa)

B
A A

(a) (b)
Rolling direction
CPRESS (MPa)

B
A

(c)
Fig. 10. Contact pressure distribution in case of: (a) elastic-plastic quasi-static solution; (b) elastic quasi-static solution; (c) elastic-plastic transient solution.

the difference of peak contact pressure magnitude between tran- 1400

sient and quasi-static solutions not exceeded 0.35% after a distance Transient
of 45 mm from the initial position of the wheel in the rolling direc- 1200
Rolling direction quasi-stac
tion. This means, when plasticity is considered; fluctuation due to
Contact pressure (MPa)

vibration is reduced due to plastic deformation that results in dis- 1000

sipation of kinetic energy, damping. In addition, the distribution of
800
contact pressure between the two methods after stabilization
occurred is almost the same as in Fig. 11.
600
Thus, explicit (transient) solution can be used in wheel-rail roll-
ing contact problem when plasticity is included in the model to 400
improve solving speed with suitable efficiency and, therefore, the
proposed model based on transient analysis will be used to analyze 200
stresses and strains for more complex situations.
0
6.3. Stress and strain results -12 -10 -8 -6 -4 -2 0 2 4 6 8 10

Distance along rolling direcon, Z (mm)

Fig. 12 depicts distribution of von Mises stress in the upper part (a)
of the railhead during the first wheel passage just under the wheel;
note that the solution zone was selected at a distance ranges from 1400
60 mm to 90 mm from the initial position of the wheel. The max- Transient
imum von Mises stress reached 476.5 MPa which exceeds yield 1200
quasi-stac
Contact pressure (MPa)

strength of rail material (379 MPa). The distribution of von Mises

1000
stress inside the contact patch is illustrated by contour plot for
two lateral cross sections (Sections 1 and 2), and one longitudinal 800
cross section along the symmetrical plane of the rolling direction
(Section 3), as indicated in Fig. 12. For cross Section 1, the maxi- 600
mum von Mises stress (476.5 MPa) located at the railhead surface
and shifted 5 mm from the rail centerline, while at the centerline of 400
the rail, the maximum von Mises stress reached 452 MPa at 3.45
mm below the railhead surface. For cross Section 2 (near to the 200
end of the contact patch), the maximum von Mises stress existed
0
at the centerline of the rail at 3.45 mm below the surface with a
-10 -8 -6 -4 -2 0 2 4 6 8 10
maximum value reached 439 MPa. These descriptions can be seen
clearly in rolling direction (Section 3). These maximum values in Distance along lateral rail direcon, X (mm)
the first cycles lead to plastification and then to the hardening of (b)
the rail steel material. Repeated application of these high stresses
at the contact surface may lead to surface damage, such as plastic Fig. 11. Contact pressure distribution for transient analysis and quasi-static
analysis in case of elastic plastic solution: (a) along rolling direction; (b) along
flow, RCF cracks, and wear, whereas high sub-surface stress may lateral direction. The origin is placed under the peak contact pressure value.
cause initiation of damage below the surface, e.g. shelling.

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Rolling direction
Mises stress (MPa)
Z
2 1

3 3

Maximum Mises
stress location 2 1

5 mm

Rail centerline
Rail centerline
Sec 1-1 Sec 2-2 Sec 3-3

Fig. 12. Von Mises stress distribution in the upper part of the railhead just under the wheel during the first wheel passage.

Railhead surface Railhead surface

PEEQ (%) PEEQ (%)

d=3.45mm d=2.3mm
4.8 mm

Rail centerline
Rail centerline

(a) (b)
Fig. 13. Distribution of equivalent plastic strain in the railhead: (a) after the first cycle; (b) after the fifteenth cycle.

300

Fig. 13 shows progress of equivalent plastic strain (PEEQ) dur-

ing cyclic loading after the first and the final, fifteenth, wheel 100
passage along the upper part of the railhead depth. After the first
wheel passage, the maximum PEEQ occurred at the centerline of -100
the rail at 3.45 mm below the railhead surface with a value
Stress (MPa)

reached 0.0073%. In addition, the depth of plastic zone extended xx

-300
to 11.5 mm below the railhead top surface. During cyclic loading, yy
it was observed that there is an accumulation of strain compo- zz
nents over cycles. However, due to material hardening, the plastic -500 xy
deformation (progressive damage) gradually increases, while xz
plastic strain rate decays. Moreover, the size of plastic zone -700 yz
increases by increasing number of wheel passages and the loca-
tion of the maximum PEEQ changed in the lateral and vertical -900
directions under cyclic loading but it still below the rail surface 0.143 0.144 0.145 0.146 0.147 0.148 0.149
and stabilized after 13 wheel passages. This behavior is due to Time (sec)
the interaction of global bending with non-linear behavior of
Fig. 14. Variation of stress components for point that suffering from maximum von
wheel material.
Mises stress.
Figs. 14 and 15 show variation of stress and strain components
for the most critical point that suffering from maximum von Mises
stress during the fifteenth wheel passages. This point is located at 6.4. Critical plane and fatigue life calculation
2.3 mm below the rail surface. It is clear that all the normal stress
components (rXX , rYY , and rZZ ) are completely in compression. Using stress and strain history obtained from submodel analy-
Therefore, shear cracking governs the fatigue life and number of sis, crack plane can be investigated by exploring all the possible
cycles to crack initiation should be evaluated using shear form planes at every material point near the railhead surface using ten-
illustrated in Eq. (5). Fig. 15 revealed that shear strain component sor transformation technique. In this study, calculations were car-
cXY and normal strain components eXX , and eYY plays the major ried out for a serious of integer points for elements that suffering
influence on plastic strain accumulation. from maximum von Mises stress at which damage may initiate.

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0.05

0.04

xx
0.03 yy
Strain (%)

zz
0.02 xy
xz
yz
0.01

0.00

-0.01
0.143 0.144 0.145 0.146 0.147 0.148 0.149
Time (sec)

Fig. 15. Variation of strain components for point that suffering from maximum von
Mises stress.

Two spherical angles h; u were utilized to represent the orienta- Fig. 17. Variation of fatigue parameter with plane orientation for the most critical
point.
tion of the crack plane normal vector, ~ n, where h is the angle
between normal vector and rolling direction; while u is the angle
between normal vector, and vertical direction. Fig. 16 indicates
definition of crack plane angles in the railhead. 0
Fig. 17 shows a contour plot of the variation of FP under 4.11 x 106
different material planes for the most critical point. This point is
located at d = 2.3 mm below the surface. It was found that a range -1
of material planes experience a very similar FP value. The most
Vercal posion (mm)

dangerous region for crack initiation occurs when h 2 [93, 162] -2

and u 2 [9, 27]. 1.30 x 106
The fatigue life to crack initiation N f based on Eq. (5) and FP max
-3
which equals 0.7 MPa was evaluated as 1.3  106 cycles. Further- 2.15 x 106
more, average daily train traffic running through the case study
used in the present investigation was collected from Egyptian com- -4
pany for Metro management and operation. It was found that 8.19 x 106
approximately 12,384 wheel passage of motor coach and 6192 -5
wheel passages of trailer running through the test site. In the pre- 15.36 x 106
sent study only wheels of motor coach were studied to obtain
rough estimation of crack initiation life. Based on these data, the -6
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16
predicted crack initiation life would be 70 days which is equivalent Nf (cyclex106)
to 14.3 Mega Gross Tones (MGT) in terms of passage of traffic.
The variation of fatigue life along railhead depth for five subsur- Fig. 18. Variation of fatigue life to crack initiation along railhead depth.
face depths is plotted in Fig. 18. The vertical distances from the
railhead surface to these five points are 0 mm, 2.3 mm, 3.45 mm,
4.6 mm, and 5.75 mm. A significant raise in the fatigue life was In the current study, the critical axial load was assumed and
observed after 2.3 mm below the railhead surface, which demon- design speed 100 km/hr was selected instead of operation speed
strates the great damage that appears near the railhead top surface 80 km/hr. Furthermore, the effect of wear mechanism which can
comparing to the sub-surface layers. alleviate fatigue crack damage, see Wang et al. [41], was neglected.
Therefore, the predicted results must be earlier than the field ones.

Rolling direction Crack seen

from above

Z
Y
X
Z Railhead surface Rolling direction
d

Crack plane
Crack plane

Fig. 16. Defination of crack plane angles.

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6.5. Field observations
Field observations were performed on the rail in service to
investigate crack location and orientation at the test site. An exam-
ple of observed cracks on the rail surface is given in Fig. 19. It
should be noted that, in railways, initiation may be considered to
have occur when the crack length reached (0.10.5 mm), see Rings-
berg [19] and Ringsberg and Bergkvist [42]. However, owing to the
difficulties to measure this length in the field, instead, cracks are
considered to be initiated when they are visible on the railhead
surface. In the field, it was observed that cracks are initiated on
the railhead surface, while the present model predicts cracks initi-
ation at some distance below the surface. Moreover, the orienta-
tion of the observed cracks on the railhead surface lies between
113 and 123, see Fig. 19, which lies in the range of the predicted
ones. Reasons for the slight deviation of the predicted results with
field observations are summarized below:
1. Relatively low value of friction coefficient presented in the FE
simulation: From the Shakedown map, which can identify the
response of material and anticipate the position of greatest
damage (surface or sub-surface) for different combinations of
friction coefficient and maximum normal contact pressure,
see Fouvry et al. [17] and Johnson [18], the high friction coeffi-
cient with the present elastic normal contact pressure value
will cause crack initiation to take place at the surface; while
for low values of friction coefficient, initiation will occur at
sub-surface.
2. The roughness of wheel-rail surfaces that was not considered in
the FE analysis. The elastic models for rough surface investi-
gated by Bucher et al. [43] indicated that surface roughness
causes very large local peaks contact stresses. However, as
reported by Magel and Kalousek [44], after the first few wheel
passages, irregularities on the rail surface are quickly obliter-
ated and become part of the interfacial layer.
3. The influence of flash temperature comes from frictional heat-
ing at the wheel-rail contact that was not considered in this
study may result in high thermal stresses concentrated at the
top surface layer results in the formation of white etching layer
from which cracks are likely to be initiated as reported by Seo
et al. [45]. Adding these stresses to the normal and tangential
stresses resulting from wheel-rail contact loads, the plastic
deformation and residual stresses would be higher than
mechanical wheel load only, see Wu et al. [46].
Nevertheless, field observations achieved a good agreement
with the predicted calculations based on FE results. Moreover,
Fig. 20 shows number of rail fractures collected from Egyptian
company for Metro management and operation per year from per-
iod 2002 to 2015 in the first line of GCUM. It can be seen, the num-
ber of reported rail fractures per year ranges from 5 to 14 fractures.
This is an evidence that cracks may be initiated below the surface,
and also growth process takes place after crack initiation and the
natural wear, by its own, cannot prevent fatigue crack initiation
or propagation stages. Thus, from maintenance point of view, it
Inside 3 cm
113-123
Rolling direction
Outside
Fig. 19. Observed defects on railhead surface at the test site.
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11
16
14
Number of rail fractures per year
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
2014
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2015
Date (year)
Fig. 20. Variation of number of rail fractures per year in the first line of GCUM.
These data were collected from Egyptian company for Metro management and
operation.
is recommended to restore the contact surface to its original state
by removing the plastically deformed layer on the rail surface at
which initiation of cracks is possible by using rail grinding process.
Based on the predicted results, grinding interval should be 14.3
MGT. However, railway companies, like Burlington Northern rail-
way (now BNSF), recommended to use grinding interval in the
range of 2460 MGT for straight track, which is higher than that
predicted. The major reason for this discrepancy comes from the
fact that, the preventive grinding strategy designed by these com-
panies based on restricting cracks to enter their rapid growth stage,
but the present model based on avoiding cracks to be initiated.
Moreover, due to the complexity of wheel-rail interface phe-
nomenon, the grinding interval cannot be constant. Thus, the pre-
dicted interval should be associated with routine monitoring to
insure satisfactory maintenance interval, but not extremely short
to limit the maintenance cost and rails downtime.
6.6. Influence of global bending on local material response
The effect of the global bending on the results obtained from
submodel analysis was studied. Two FE analyses were carried out
for fifteen wheel passages. In the first analysis (model I) the driven
variables derived in the global model were transferred to the rele-
vant boundary nodes of the submodel as discussed in the previous
sections. In the second model (model II), all degrees of freedom
were restrained at both cross sections and bottom to neglect global
bending. The results in two models showed accumulation of effec-
tive plastic strain (ratchetting) after every wheel passage as indi-
cated in Fig. 21. However, the ratchetting rate in model I is
higher than that in model II. Furthermore, the maximum equiva-
lent plastic strain in both cases was located below the rail surface
at depth 2.3 mm and 3.45 mm for model I and model II, respec-
tively after the final wheel passage. This is because of shear strain
that has a maximum value below the railhead surface. The number
of cycles to fatigue crack initiation in model II was computed as
N f = 19.59  106 cycles which corresponding to FP max
0.208 MPa. In addition, the most dangerous region for crack initia-
tion exits when h 2 [63, 87] and u 2 [99, 114]. Comparing the
results obtained from two FE models, a great difference of fatigue
crack initiation life and critical plane angle in longitudinal direc-
tion between the two FE models was observed. The large variation
12 H.M. El-sayed et al. / Ain Shams Engineering Journal xxx (2017) xxxxxx

0.09 Rolling direction

model I
0.08 CPRESS (MPa)
model II IRJ
0.07

B
0.06
A
PEEQ (%)

0.05

0.04

0.03 (a)
1600
0.02
1400
0.01 IRJ Rolling direction
1200

Contact presssure (MPa)

0
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 1000
Number of wheel passages
800
Fig. 21. Variation of maximum equivalent plastic strain component with number of
wheel passages for the two FE models. 600

between the two FE models demonstrates the importance of
including global bending effect in FE simulations.
6.7. Influence of insulated rail joints (IRJs) or track discontinuity on
local material response
Modern railways, like GCUM, use IRJs to electrically isolate sec-
tions of railway track to create single blocks with the aim to control
signaling system for safe train operations and are sometimes useful
in detecting broken rails. The IRJ assembly must include a small
gap between the two rail ends filled with an insulating material
called endpost causing structural discontinuity in the longitudinal
direction of the rail. Therefore, another FE model was performed to
investigate the effect of such discontinuity on local material
response based on IRJ design used in GCUM. Schematic drawing
of the modeled wheel-rail parts with IRJ is depicted in Fig. 22. As
can be seen, the width of the endpost is 8 mm bonded together
with the two rail ends. The insulating material is made from fiber
glass. In the present investigation, it was modeled as linear elastic
with elastic modulus 4.5 GPa and passions ratio 0.19, see Chen and
Kuang [47]. This analysis was performed for 10 wheel passages
with the same operation conditions previously defined.
Fig. 23 points out the contact pressure distribution when the
wheel passing over the endpost during the first wheel passage. A
Rolling direction
17
8
80
Wheel start point
Wheel part
Rail end 1
70
400
200
0
-10 -6 -2 2 6 10 14 18
Distance along rolling direcon, Z (mm)
(b)
Fig. 23. Contact pressure distribution when the wheel passing over the IRJ during
the first wheel passage: (a) on the railhead surface; (b) along the rolling direction.
great deviation in the contact pressure distribution and in the con-
tact pressure magnitude was obtained when the contact point is
over the endpost comparing with results obtained from continuous
rail, case indicated in Fig. 10. The presence of IRJ increased the peak
contact pressure value by 39.4%. This value is concentrated at the
rail end 1 resulting in the contact pressure singularity, which
may accelerate deterioration not only for the railhead material,
but also for all track components. Moreover, the contact area at
the IRJ is separated into two regions. The first region is on the rail
and the second is on the endpost. Over the endpost, the contact
pressure is reduced significantly by 94% with a relatively uniform
distribution. This discrepancy comes from high difference of
youngs modulus between the rail and the endpost material.
Fig. 24 indicates variation of PEEQ under cyclic wheel passages
for four depths at the two rail ends, where highest damage is
observed. The distance from the railhead surface to these depths
are 0 mm, 0.8 mm, 1.6 mm, and 2.5 mm. The results revealed that,
there is an accumulation of plastic deformation over cyclic loading
for both the two rail ends with a decaying in ratchetting rate. How-
32 ever, the rail end 1 surface is severally deformed in comparison
25
with the rail end 2, which agrees with field observation that was
carried out on some of IRJs samples; while at the subsurface, the
Wheel end point
situation is rather the opposite. Comparing these results with that
obtained in model I and model II (Section 6.6), the contact singular-
ity at the IRJ increased maximum PEEQ by 103.17% and 236.32%
Rail end 2 with respect to model I and model II, respectively, after ten wheel
passages, and translated the peak value of PEEQ from subsurface to

Y the top surface layer. This affirms that the main damage mecha-
Z
Endpost nism close the IRJ region is ratchetting rather than LCF, which gives
X All dimensions in mm a good agreement with shakedown map. Estimation and optimiza-
tion of IRJs life will be studied more thoroughly in further work.
Fig. 22. Schematic drawing of the modeled wheel-rail parts with IRJ.

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 H.M. El-sayed et al. / Ain Shams Engineering Journal xxx (2017) xxxxxx 13

0.125 4. The developed finite element model has the ability to predict
Depth= 0 mm the critical plane angles at which cracks may be initiated in
Depth= 0.8 mm the railhead. The predicted angles agreed well with observa-
0.1 Depth= 1.6 mm tions at the test site in the first line of Greater Cairo Under-
Depth= 2.5 mm ground Metro in Egypt.
5. The predicted fatigue life to crack initiation for the simulation
0.075 case was 1.3 x 106 wheel passages. Based on the collected data
PEEQ (%)

about average daily train traffic, the predicted crack initiation

life would be 70 days (or 14.3 Mega Gross Tones in terms of
0.05
passage of traffic). Therefore, it is recommended to use rail
grinding process as a routine maintenance with 14.3 Mega
Gross Tones in interval between each grinding cycle to protect
0.025
rail from initiation of cracks associated with field monitoring
to insure that this interval is satisfactory.
6. The influence of global bending on local material response was
0
investigated. The obtained results affirmed that the global
0 2 4 6 8 10
bending plays a significant effect on fatigue crack initiation life
Number of wheel passages
and critical plane angles. Therefore, this parameter must be
(a) included in the finite element simulation to give realistic
0.1 results.
Depth= 0 mm 7. The rail end surface at the insulated rail joint is severally
Depth= 0.8 mm strained in comparison with continuous rails. This affirms that
Depth= 1.6 mm the main damage mechanism at the insulated rail joint is
0.075
Depth= 2.5 mm ratchetting.
PEEQ (%)

0.05
References

0.025
0 [4] Grassie SL. Maintenance of the wheel-rail interface. Woodhead Publishing
0 2 4 6 8 10
Number of wheel passages
(b)
Fig. 24. Variation of equivalent plastic strain component with number of wheel
passages for: (a) the rail end 1; (b) the rail end 2.
7. Conclusions
In the present investigation, a numerical procedure was per-
formed to estimate cracks initiation in the railhead due to rolling
contact fatigue through correcting drawbacks of the previous stud-
ies. The obtained results and observations from the finite element
simulation in this study are summarized below:
1. Mesh sensitivity analysis showed that the element size of
1.2  1.2 mm can provide accurate contact solution with
acceptable time consuming.
2. Contact problem between wheel-rail was performed using
explicit and implicit algorithm. The obtained results revealed
the ability of the explicit solution in solving wheel-rail rolling
contact problem, and its efficiency over implicit solution in
improving solving speed especially when material nonlinearity
is included in the finite element model.
3. The contact pressure magnitude at the contact zone reduces
sharply in case of elastic-plastic solution compared with elastic
ones as a result of increasing conformity of the two contacting
bodies. Therefore, plasticity effect must be considered to avoid
contact load overestimation.
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Please cite this article in press as: El-sayed HM et al. Prediction of fatigue crack initiation life in railheads using finite element analysis. Ain Shams Eng J
(2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.asej.2017.06.003
14 H.M. El-sayed et al. / Ain Shams Engineering Journal xxx (2017) xxxxxx

of the 10th international conference on contact mechanics CM 2015, Colorado Hossam Mohamed El-sayed received the Bachelor
Springs, Colorado, USA. degree in Civil engineering in 2013 and he is a Master
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simulation. Int. J. Plast 2000;16:381409. Suez Canal University, Egypt since 2014. His main
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[28] Li S. Railway Sleeper Modeling with deterministic and non-deterministic Ph.D., 2013, from Aerospace department, faculty of
support conditions M.Sc. thesis. Sweden: Royal Institute of Technology; March
Engineering, Cairo University. He is currently a Lecturer
2012.
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2009;267:5404. way Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Ain Shams
[42] Ringsberg JW, Bergkvist A. On propagation of short rolling contact fatigue University, Egypt. His research interests dynamic effect
cracks. Fatigue Fract Engng Mater Struct 2003;26:96983. of railway movement on the track.
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Please cite this article in press as: El-sayed HM et al. Prediction of fatigue crack initiation life in railheads using finite element analysis. Ain Shams Eng J
(2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.asej.2017.06.003