Abstract Railway track designers and maintenance entities have long been pursuing for a robust and reliable method to predict the track’s long-term behaviour. The complexity of this railway system, in terms of its changing structural and material behaviour throughout its life cycle, have hindered that quest. This paper presents a novel computer implementation focused on the estimation of the ballast and sub-ballast long-term deformation that provides a realistic reproduction of the actual behaviour of the structures because (i) it considers the three-dimensional aspect of the problem, (ii) incorporates accurate non-linear resilient material laws for the granular layers, (iii) uses a robust constitutive high-cycle strain accumulation model specifically devised for railway tracks that accounts for the three-dimensional stress conditions to determine both the volumetric and deviatoric permanent deformations and (iv) explicitly considers the dynamic train-track interaction. After calibration and validation with the results from an experimental case study comprising a physical model, a simulation scenario, considering different train types, is presented to demonstrate the potential of this approach. This implementation allows the construction of sufficiently extensive and elaborate representations of the railway track, allowing the study of geometrically complex cases and of the influence of many other aspects on its long-term behaviour.

中文翻译：

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考虑火车轨道相互作用和骨料非线性弹性行为的铁路轨道长期变形——3D FEM 实现

摘要 铁路轨道设计者和维护实体长期以来一直在寻求一种稳健可靠的方法来预测轨道的长期行为。就其在整个生命周期中不断变化的结构和材料行为而言，该铁路系统的复杂性阻碍了这一探索。本文提出了一种新颖的计算机实现，专注于估计镇流器和副镇流器的长期变形，它提供了结构实际行为的真实再现，因为（i）它考虑了问题的三维方面，（ ii) 为颗粒层包含准确的非线性弹性材料定律，(iii) 使用专为铁路轨道设计的稳健本构高周应变累积模型，该模型考虑了三维应力条件，以确定体积和偏斜永久变形，并且 (iv) 明确考虑动态列车-轨道相互作用。在使用包含物理模型的实验案例研究的结果进行校准和验证后，提出了一个考虑不同列车类型的模拟场景，以证明这种方法的潜力。这种实现允许构建足够广泛和精细的铁路轨道表示，允许研究几何复杂的情况以及许多其他方面对其长期行为的影响。