Thermal Analysis of Simplified Railway Brake Blocks with Different Designs

Abstract

The main problem with braking and stopping a railway vehicle is that the brake can heat up to a high temperature in a very short time. The dissipation of the generated heat is an important task, because the high thermal loads can cause cracks and deformation on the brake block. In this article, a simplified brake model is presented, on which both tribological experiments and finite element simulations were performed. The test results show good agreement with the heating conditions of real railway brake blocks on basis of literature. Microscopic examination of previously used real brake blocks clearly shows the different levels of heat load on the friction surface parts of the brake blocks. Instead of the currently used cast iron brake blocks, printed test specimens were made from metal powder material suitable for additive manufacturing. For better heat conduction, various shaped copper inserts were placed into the test specimen. It is also shown that if even a few percent of a material with good thermal conductivity are placed in the test specimen with appropriate geometry, the thermal conductivity of the test specimen can be significantly improved. Our goal is to use numerical simulation to find a geometric design that will most effectively remove heat from the higher temperature parts of the friction surface.