OPEN ACCESS
An axle bearing is one of the most important components to guarantee the service life of a rail car. In order to ensure the stable and reliable bearing life, it is essential to estimate the fatigue life of an axle bearing under the loading conditions. The fatigue life of a bearing is affected by many parameters such as material properties, heat treatment, lubrication conditions, operating temperature, loading conditions, bearing geometry, the internal clearance of bearing, and so on. Because these factors are so complicatedly related to each other, it is very important to investigate the effects of these factors on the axle bearing life. This paper presents the process of estimating the fatigue life of a railroad roller bearing, which takes into account geometric parameters of the bearing in the life calculation. The load distributions of the bearing were determined by solving numerically force and moment equilibrium equations with Lundberg’s approximate model. This paper focuses on analyzing the effects of bearing geometric parameters on the fatigue life using Taguchi method.
fatigue life, internal geometric parameter, railway axlebox, Taguchi method, tapered roller bearing unit
[1] Harris, T.A. & Kotazlas, M.N., Rolling Bearing Analysis, CRC/Taylor & Francis: Boca Raton, 1991.
[2] Cretu, S., Bercea, I. & Mitu, N., A dynamic analysis of tapered roller bearing under fully flooded conditions. Wear, 188, pp. 1–18, 1995. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/0043-1648(94)06552-7
[3] Bercea, I., Cretu, S. & Nelias, D., Analysis of double-row tapered roller bearings. Tribology Transactions, 46(2), pp. 228–239, 2003. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10402000308982622
[4] Tong, V.C. & Hong, S.W., Characteristics of tapered roller bearing subjected to combined radial and moment loads. International Journal of Precision Engineering and Manufacturing–Green Technology, 1(4), pp. 323–328, 2014. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s40684-014-0040-1
[5] Warda, B. & Chudzik, A., Fatigue life prediction of the radial roller bearing with the correction of roller generators. International Journal of Mechanical Sciences, 89, pp. 299–310, 2014. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijmecsci.2014.09.015
[6] Ferreira, J.L.A., Balthazar, J.C. & Araujo, A.P.N., An investigation of rail bearing reliability under real conditions of use. Engineering Failure Analysis, 10, pp. 745–758, 2003. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S1350-6307(02)00052-3
[7] Bearing Calculation (Chapter 5). Topics in SKF Railway Technical Handbook, SKF Group, pp. 106–121, 2012.
[8] Lai, K., Lim, S. & Teh, P., Optimization of electrostatic separation process for maximizing biowaste recovery using Taguchi method and ANOVA. Polish Journal of Environmental Studies, 24(3), pp. 1125–1131, 2015. http://dx.doi.org/10.15244/pjoes/30927