Lanterna Rally

Author: Milton R. Johnson

Publisher:

Published: 1981

Total Pages: 51

ISBN-13:

The dynamic response of a typical railroad tank car head shield and its attachments was examined during car-coupling impact tests to determine its expected fatigue performance. The work was based on data obtained on car-coupling impact tests. The test car and one of its head shields were instrumented with transducers to provide a continuous output of strains, forces, and accelerations. The largest strains were measured on the anvil car tests, which was a test where the instrumented car was struck by a moving car. A dynamic finite element analysis was conducted to provide a means for extrapolating experimental strain data to other locations in the head shield structure. The analysis showed that the maximum strains were about twice the maximum measured strains. The fatigue analysis of the head shield and support structure was restricted to an examination of the effects of car-coupling impacts. The total expected fatigue damage was expressed as the sum of the percentages of fatigue damage in each strain range. The calculation predicted that the annual damage was a very small percentage of the expected fatigue life, being less than 0.2 percent. From a practical standpoint it was concluded that the head shield would have an infinite fatigue life. (Author).