Simulation Analysis and Verification of Temperature and Stress of Wheel-Mounted Brake Disc of a High-Speed Train

Abstract

During the braking process, a large amount of heat energy is generated at the friction surfaces between the brake disc and pads and rapidly dissipates into the disc volume. In this paper, a three-dimensional thermo-mechanical coupling model of high-speed wheel-mounted brake discs containing bolted joints and contact relationships is established. The direct coupling method is used to analyze the temperature and stress of the brake discs during an emergency braking event with an initial speed of 300 km/h. A full-scale bench test is also conducted to monitor the temperatures of the friction ring and bolted joints. The simulation result shows that the surface temperature of the friction ring reaches its peak value of 414 °C after 102 s of braking, which agrees well with the bench test result. The maximum alternating thermal stress occurs in the bolt hole where the maximum circumferential compressive stress is − 658 MPa and the maximum circumferential tensile stress is 134 MPa. During the braking process, the out-of-plane deformation of the middle part of the friction ring is larger than that of the edge, which increases the axial tensile load of the connecting bolt. This work provides support for the design of brake discs and connecting bolts.

Numerical and experimental study of the relationship between friction area and temperature of aluminium-based brake disc

“…The temperature gradient is defined as the quotient between the temperature difference of nodes at both ends of each region and the regional length. The formulation is defined as equation (1).…”

“…The basic braking device for high-speed train converts kinetic energy into thermal energy to achieve stop through the friction between brake disc and brake pads. 1,2 From a macro perspective, brake disc is subjected to strong thermal shock in operation, which can lead to thermal fatigue cracks, thus affecting the service life of brake disc. 3 On the micro-scale, the increase of temperature will lead to the change of material properties in the contact zone, which will affect the contact behavior between the asperity and the friction and wear process.…”

Simulated and experimental study on the relationship between coefficient of friction and temperature of aluminum-based brake disc

“…The basic braking device for high-speed trains converts kinetic energy into heat energy to achieve a stop through the friction between the brake disc and pads (Qu et al , 2018). The massive heat generated by friction can result in severe wear of the friction pair during the short braking process (Meng et al , 2018).…”