Safety to Crosswind of Railway Vehicles in Presence of Wind Barriers: Numerical-Experimental Approach

When a high-speed vehicle is subjected to cross wind action, one of the most critical problem connected with running safety is the risk of overturning. To prevent this risk a possible solution is the installation, sideway to railway, of windbreak barriers against cross wind. To evaluate the new level of overturning risk associated to the line sector equipped with wind barriers or, otherwise, to evaluate the level of shielding required to the wind barrier to obtain a pre-defined level of risk, a stochastic methodology for the calculation of the new Characteristic Wind Curves associated to a rail-way vehicle in presence of windbreak barriers has been setup. According to the developed experimental-numerical methodology, first of all wind tunnel tests are performed for the evaluation of the admittance function in presence of barrier and then, by a multi-body model, the vehicle dynamics subjected to cross wind in presence of barrier is evaluated.