Analysis of edge effects on rail-wheel contact

This study considers the contact occurring in rail-wheel systems. Here the edge effect of the gauge face of the rail on the contact stress and contact geometry is investigated. The rail head is modeled as a three-dimensional elastic wedge which may have an arbitrary wedge angle. The solution procedure consists of deriving a Green's function for the normal displacement on the surface of an incompressible wedge loaded by a point normal force. The point force is then distributed to obtain an integral equation for frictionless contact. Numerical results are given for the rigid spherical indentation of an incompressible quarter-space.