Experimental Study on Contact Force between a Train Wheel and a Prestressed Concrete Sleeper

This paper describes the static and the impact experiments using a wheel shaped contact shoe and prestressed concrete sleepers (PC sleeper) to simulate the phenomenon that train wheels are expected to collide with PC sleepers when a railway vehicle is derailed by a large-scale earthquake. These experiments clarified the following items: firstly, the maximum force obtained in the static and the impact experiments were almost equal except for the case of loading at the edge side in the longer direction of the sleeper. Secondary, regarding fracture mode, it became clear that flexure fracture, delamination fracture or shear fracture could be classified, not by the loading method but by the loading position. Thirdly, regarding contact stiffness, it differs according to the loading method and loading position.