• Title/Summary/Keyword: Modular Track

Search Result 13, Processing Time 0.03 seconds

Influence of shear bolt connections on modular precast steel-concrete composites for track support structures

  • Mirza, Olivia;Kaewunruen, Sakdirat
    • Steel and Composite Structures
    • /
    • v.27 no.5
    • /
    • pp.647-659
    • /
    • 2018
  • Through extensive research, there exist a new type of connection between railway bridge girders and steel-concrete composite panels. In addition to conventional shear connectors, newly developed blind bolts have been recently adopted for retrofitting. However, the body of knowledge on their influence and application to railway structures has not been thoroughly investigated. This study has thus placed a particular emphasis on the application of blind bolts on the Sydney Harbour Bridge as a feasible alternative constituent of railway track upgrading. Finite element modeling has been used to simulate the behaviours of the precast steel-concrete panels with common types of bolt connection using commercially available package, ABAQUS. The steel-concrete composite track slabs have been designed in accordance with Australian Standards AS5100. These precast steel-concrete panels are then numerically retrofitted by three types of most practical bold connections: head studded shear connector, Ajax blind bolt and Lindapter hollow bolt. The influences of bolt connections on load and stress transfers and structural behaviour of the composite track slabs are highlighted in this paper. The numerical results exhibit that all three bolts can distribute stresses effectively and can be installed on the bridge girder. However, it is also found that Lindapter hollow bolts are superior in minimising structural responses of the composite track slabs to train loading.

Free vibrations of precast modular steel-concrete composite railway track slabs

  • Kimani, Stephen Kimindiri;Kaewunruen, Sakdirat
    • Steel and Composite Structures
    • /
    • v.24 no.1
    • /
    • pp.113-128
    • /
    • 2017
  • This paper highlights a study undertaken on the free vibration of a precast steel-concrete composite slab panel for track support. The steel-concrete composite slab track is an evolvement from the slab track, a form of ballastless track which is becoming increasingly attractive to asset owners as they seek to reduce lifecycle costs and deal with increasing rail traffic speeds. The slender nature of the slab panel due to its reduced depth of construction makes it susceptible to vibration problems. The aim of the study is driven by the need to address the limited research available to date on the dynamic behaviour of steel-concrete composite slab panels for track support. Free vibration analysis of the track slab has been carried out using ABAQUS. Both eigenfrequencies and eigenmodes have been extracted using the Lanczos method. The fundamental natural frequencies of the slab panel have been identified together with corresponding mode shapes. To investigate the sensitivity of the natural frequencies and mode shapes, parametric studies have been established, considering concrete strength and mass and steel's modulus of elasticity. This study is the world first to observe crossover phenomena that result in the inversion of the natural orders without interaction. It also reveals that replacement of the steel with aluminium or carbon fibre sheeting can only marginally reduce the natural frequencies of the slab panel.

Damped frequencies of precast modular steel-concrete composite railway track slabs

  • Kaewunruen, Sakdirat;Kimani, Stephen Kimindiri
    • Steel and Composite Structures
    • /
    • v.25 no.4
    • /
    • pp.427-442
    • /
    • 2017
  • This paper presents unprecedented damped oscillation behaviours of a precast steel-concrete composite slab panel for track support. The steel-concrete composite slab track is an innovative slab track, a form of ballastless track which is becoming increasingly attractive to asset owners as they seek to reduce lifecycle costs and deal with increasing rail traffic speeds. The slender nature of the slab panel due to its reduced depth of construction makes it susceptible to vibration problems. The aim of the study is driven by the need to address the limited research available to date on the dynamic behaviour of steel-concrete composite slab panels for track support. Free vibration analysis of the track slab has been carried out using ABAQUS. Both undamped and damped eigenfrequencies and eigenmodes have been extracted using the Lancsoz method. The fundamental natural frequencies of the slab panel have been identified together with corresponding mode shapes. To investigate the sensitivity of the natural frequencies and mode shapes, parametric studies have been established, considering concrete strength and mass and steel's modulus of elasticity. This study is the world first to observe crossover phenomena that result in the inversion of the natural orders without interaction. It also reveals that replacement of the steel with aluminium or carbon fibre sheeting can only marginally reduce the natural frequencies of the slab panel.

Circulating Current Harmonics Suppression for Modular Multilevel Converters Based on Repetitive Control

  • Li, Binbin;Xu, Dandan;Xu, Dianguo
    • Journal of Power Electronics
    • /
    • v.14 no.6
    • /
    • pp.1100-1108
    • /
    • 2014
  • Modular multilevel converters (MMCs) have emerged as the most promising topology for high and medium voltage applications for the coming years. However, one particular negative characteristic of MMCs is the existence of circulating current, which contains a dc component and a series of low-frequency even-order ac harmonics. If not suppressed, these ac harmonics will distort the arm currents, increase the power loses, and cause higher current stresses on the semiconductor devices. Repetitive control (RC) is well known due to its distinctive capabilities in tracking periodic signals and eliminating periodic errors. In this paper, a novel circulating current control scheme base on RC is proposed to effectively track the dc component and to restrain the low-frequency ac harmonics. The integrating function is inherently embedded in the RC controller. Therefore, the proposed circulating current control only parallels the RC controller with a proportional controller. Thus, conflicts between the RC controller and the traditional proportional integral (PI) controller can be avoided. The design methodologies of the RC controller and a stability analysis are also introduced. The validity of the proposed circulating current control approach has been verified by simulation and experimental results based on a three-phase MMC downscaled prototype.

Quasi-Fixed-Frequency Hysteresis Current Tracking Control Strategy for Modular Multilevel Converters

  • Mei, Jun;Ji, Yu;Du, Xiaozhou;Ma, Tian;Huang, Can;Hu, Qinran
    • Journal of Power Electronics
    • /
    • v.14 no.6
    • /
    • pp.1147-1156
    • /
    • 2014
  • This study proposes a quasi-fixed-frequency hysteresis current tracking control strategy for modular multilevel converters (MMCs) on the basis of voltage partition principle. First, by monitoring the grid voltage and the deviation between the output and reference currents, the output voltage is determined, thus prompting the output current to quickly and efficiently track the given current. Second, the voltages of the upper/lower capacitor of the arm and the voltages between the upper and lower arms are balanced by combining these arms with virtual loop mapping and arm voltage balance control, respectively. In particular, the proposed method is designed for any level and number of sub-modules. The validity of the proposed method is verified by simulations and experimental results of a five-level MMC prototype.

Design and modelling of pre-cast steel-concrete composites for resilient railway track slabs

  • Mirza, Olivia;Kaewunruen, Sakdirat;Kwok, Kenny;Griffin, Dane W.P.
    • Steel and Composite Structures
    • /
    • v.22 no.3
    • /
    • pp.537-565
    • /
    • 2016
  • Australian railway networks possess a large amount of aging timber components and need to replace them in excess of 280 thousands $m^3$ per year. The relatively high turnover of timber sleepers (crossties in a plain track), bearers (skeleton ties in a turnout), and transoms (bridge cross beams) is responsible for producing greenhouse gas emissions 6 times greater than an equivalent reinforced concrete counterparts. This paper presents an innovative solution for the replacement of aging timber transoms installed on existing railway bridges along with the incorporation of a continuous walkway platform, which is proven to provide environmental, safety and financial benefits. Recent developments for alternative composite materials to replace timber components in railway infrastructure construction and maintenance demonstrate some compatibility issues with track stiffness as well as structural and geometrical track systems. Structural concrete are generally used for new railway bridges where the comparatively thicker and heavier fixed slab track systems can be accommodated. This study firstly demonstrates a novel and resilient alterative by incorporating steel-concrete composite slab theory and combines the capabilities of being precast and modulated, in order to reduce the depth, weight and required installation time relative to conventional concrete direct-fixation track slab systems. Clear benefits of the new steel-concrete composites are the maintainability and constructability, especially for existing railway bridges (or brown fields). Critical considerations in the design and finite element modelling for performance benchmarking of composite structures and their failure modes are highlighted in this paper, altogether with risks, compatibilities and compliances.

Modular Neural Network Recognition System for Robot Endeffector Recognition (로봇 Endeffector 인식을 위한 다중 모듈 신경회로망 인식 시스템)

  • 신진욱;박동선
    • The Journal of Korean Institute of Communications and Information Sciences
    • /
    • v.29 no.5C
    • /
    • pp.618-626
    • /
    • 2004
  • In this paper, we describe a robot endeffector recognition system based on a Modular Neural Networks (MNN). The proposed recognition system can be used for vision system which track a given object using a sequence of images from a camera unit. The main objective to achieve with the designed MNN is to precisely recognize the given robot endeffector and to minimize the processing time. Since the robot endeffector can be viewed in many different shapes in 3- D space, a MNN structure, which contains a set of feedforwared neural networks, can be more attractive in recognizing the given object. Each single neural network learns the endeffector with a cluster of training patterns. The training MNN patterns for a neural network share the similar characteristics so that they can be easily trained. The trained UM is les s sensitive to noise and it shows the better performance in recognizing the endeffector. The recognition rate of MNN is enhanced by 14% over the single neural network. A vision system with the MNN can precisely recognize the endeffector and place it at the center of a display for a remote operator.

Visual Tracking Technique Based on Projective Modular Active Shape Model (투영적 모듈화 능동 형태 모델에 기반한 영상 추적 기법)

  • Kim, Won
    • Journal of the Korea Society for Simulation
    • /
    • v.18 no.2
    • /
    • pp.77-89
    • /
    • 2009
  • Visual tracking technique is one of the essential things which are very important in the major fields of modern society. While contour tracking is especially necessary technique in the aspect of its fast performance with target's external contour information, it sometimes fails to track target motion because it is affected by the surrounding edges around target and weak egdes on the target boundary. To overcome these weak points, in this research it is suggested that PDMs can be obtained by generating the virtual 6-DOF motions of the mobile robot with a CCD camera and the image tracking system which is robust to the local minima around the target can be configured by constructing Active Shape Model in modular base. To show the effectiveness of the proposed method, the experiment is performed on the image stream obtained by a real mobile robot and the better performance is confirmed by comparing the experimental results with the ones of other major tracking techniques.

A Study on Air and Gas System of Coal Fired Power Plant (석탄화력발전소의 공기 및 가스시스템 모델에 관한 연구)

  • Jung, Hwan-Joo;Kim, Tae-Hyun;Ryoo, Young-Jae;Chang, Young-Hak;Moon, Chae-Joo
    • Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
    • /
    • 2002.07a
    • /
    • pp.283-285
    • /
    • 2002
  • Boiler combustion systems are large, non-linear systems with numerous interactions between its component parts. In the analysis of such complex systems. dynamic simulation is recognized as a powerful method of keeping track of the myriad of interactions. This paper shows and discusses the developed analysis model, such as the forced draft fan the primary air fan, the furnace and burner system, pulverizer, air preheater and induced draft fan, etc. in accordance with BMCR condition of boiler using the Modular Modeling System(MMS) software.

  • PDF