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Advantages of steel wheels SkyWay
Comparison of conventional railway wheel and innovative unibus wheel.
Fig. 1. Conventional railway wheel
Increased wheel wear and noise due to the following:
- big contact stresses (1,000 MPa and more), caused by a small size of contact patch;
- slipping in the contact patch, caused by a difference of seating diameters in the conical surface of the wheel;
- operation of brake mechanisms (brake shoes cause additional wheel thread wear);
- big static and dynamic wheel loads combined with inevitable track irregularities;
- a rigid wheel pair prone to self oscillations, which increase wear and noise;
- symmetrical load application onto the rail head.
Fig. 2. Innovative unibus wheel
Calculation of contact stress for high-speed Unibus with gross weight of 5 tons:
Thus, advantages of SkyWay transport wheels:
- insignificant contact stress (less than 200 MPa) due to a wide contact patch (by rail head width);
- no slipping in the contact patch (cylinder rolling along the plane);
- disk brake mechanisms and ABS, which prevents wheels locking;
- small wheel load and absence of joints on the track;
- symmetrical rail head wear (vertically and horizontally);
- minor wheel rolling resistance due to a narrow contact patch (in direction of wheel rolling).
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