Alternative End Frame Design of Passenger Rail Cab Car

Details

• Creators:
  Martinez, Eloy
• Corporate Creators:
  United States. Department of Transportation. Federal Railroad Administration. Office of Research, Development, and Technology
• Corporate Contributors:
  United States. Federal Railroad Administration
• Subject/TRT Terms:
  Cab Cars Crashworthiness Performanace End Frame Design Passenger Cars Passengers
• Publication/ Report Number:
  RR06-16
• Resource Type:
  Tech Report
• Geographical Coverage:
  United States
• Corporate Publisher:
  United States. Department of Transportation. Federal Railroad Administration
• Abstract:
  At the request of the American Public Transportation Association (APTA), the Office of Research and Development of the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) conducted a series of full-scale grade crossing tests. The purpose of the tests was to demonstrate the enhanced performance of cab car end frame designs promulgated in Federal requirements and the industry standard adopted by APTA in 1999. Two end frame designs were developed. The first design was representative of cars built before the promulgation of the requirements and standards and referred to as the 1990’s design. The second design incorporated all the enhanced strength-based design requirements, as well as a requirement that the corner or collision post be able to experience “severe deformations” without experiencing failure at the connections. This design was referred to as the state-of-the-art (SOA) design. The impact conditions to be tested were planned at several meetings of APTA’s Passenger Railroad Equipment Safety Standards (PRESS) Construction and Structural (C&S) group. The final scenario agreed upon by the group was a grade crossing scenario where the corner post is loaded above the end beam. This scenario puts the operator at greatest risk due to the loss of survivable volume. This condition is similar to accidents occurred in Yardley, PA, and Portage, IN, where a steel coil penetrated the end of a cab car, resulting in the loss of several lives. The test speed was determined from initial large deformation crush and collision dynamic calculations such that the steel coil would penetrate the 1990’s design by a distance greater than 1 foot and not penetrate the SOA design by the same distance.
• Format:
  PDF
• Collection(s):
  Federal Railroad Administration US Transportation Collection
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha256:b2947075126b9498e39621f5536b2cb80c9ac0a83332aa56289f04071cf4c59a
• Download URL:
  https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/40514/dot_40514_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 198.03 KB ]