Running Safety and Behavior Tests for a Scaled-Down Railway Vehicle Crossing a Floating Bridge

Abstract

This paper proposes a test method to evaluate the operability of railway vehicles crossing floating bridges. To inspect the dynamic response of the floating bridge to the railway vehicle, the test setup was separated into wave tank and shake table tests. A scaled-down model representing a unit length of the floating bridge span was manufactured for the wave tank test. Several harmonic waves were artificially created and the displacement at the center above the top surface was measured using an optical position sensor. The response of the floating structure was analyzed to extract the relative amplitude versus the input wave for sway, heave, and roll. The harmonic motions using these responses were simultaneously used as input signals for a six-degree-of-freedom shake table. The scaled-down bogie model ran back and forth repeatedly on the railway placed on the shake table. The acceleration measured from the railway vehicle was analyzed to evaluate the running safety and behavior. All tests were performed without allowing derailment and showed sufficient margin to satisfy the running safety and behavior standards. The proposed test method was successfully conducted and showed a remarkable potential to evaluate the operation of railway vehicles on floating bridges under various wave conditions.