Recent studies have evaluated mechanical contact phenomena through numerical simulations. Commonly, in the wheel-rail context for railway engineering applications, the wheel-rail contact and related phenomena have been addressed by the twin-disc test. It offers reliable information and insights for the study of phenomena such as wear and rolling contact fatigue—RCF. A numerical evaluation, in this context, may offer a complementary approach to understand these phenomena. In this context, stress and strain fields may be obtained and provide a basis for discussion and better interpretation of physical tests. The present work seeks to evaluate and understand the contact interaction in the twin-disc test with the aid of computational simulations using mainly the finite element method. The numerical reproduction of all inherent characteristics of the test is a challenging task. More specifically, the relative slip rate of the discs, a key kinematic parameter of the physical test, represents a crucial feature of the modelling process. There is specific software, such as CONTACT, where the inherent characteristics of the rolling contact are easily manipulated and can be used as a reference for the sake of comparison of results on the contact interface. The main contribution of the herein proposed approach is the reproduction of the so-called creep curves, while the stress–strain fields of the discs are fully assessed. The numerical results represent a conceptual base for better interpretation of the experiments. This leads to a discussion on predicting crack initiation candidate points and wear-prone regions, thus providing a numerical–theoretical source for explanation of some results observed in the literature.

最近的研究通过数值模拟评估了机械接触现象。通常，在铁路工程应用的轮轨环境中，双盘测试已经解决了轮轨接触和相关现象。它为研究磨损和滚动接触疲劳——RCF 等现象提供了可靠的信息和见解。在这种情况下，数值评估可以提供一种补充方法来理解这些现象。在这种情况下，可以获得应力和应变场，并为讨论和更好地解释物理测试提供基础。目前的工作旨在通过主要使用有限元方法的计算模拟来评估和理解双盘测试中的接触相互作用。测试所有固有特征的数值再现是一项具有挑战性的任务。更具体地说，圆盘的相对滑动率是物理测试的一个关键运动学参数，代表了建模过程的一个关键特征。有专门的软件，比如CONTACT，滚动接触的固有特性很容易被操纵，可以作为参考，以便在接触界面上进行结果的比较。本文提出的方法的主要贡献是复制所谓的蠕变曲线，同时充分评估了圆盘的应力 - 应变场。数值结果代表了更好地解释实验的概念基础。这导致了关于预测裂纹萌生候选点和易磨损区域的讨论，