ABSTRACT
This chapter presents a simple, semi-analytical model for discrete-continuous railway track, which is very fast and includes all relevant effects of vertical track vibrations, such as the effect of parametric excitation while a wheelset or a vehicle is moving on discretely supported track. This semi-analytical track model, which has all advantages of existing frequency domain track models, can be used in the frequency domain or in the time domain. The semi-analytical track model be used for the simulation of the dynamic behaviour of a wheelset or a vehicle moving on a track with irregularities. It also used in order to investigate the stability behaviour of high frequency vibrations. Using the semi-analytical tool it seems to be possible to integrate the complex track structure in to arbitrary vehicle/track interaction models. The simple reliable models describes all relevant effects of vehicle/track interaction in a moderate frequency range, as an effective tool for design and optimization procedures.
