Engineering Design, Testing and Service of a High Speed Light Weight Monobloc Wheel

Lovere Sidermeccanica, Fiat Ferroviaria Savigliano and the Italian Railways discuss their common experience on engineering design, fatigue test and service of a high speed solid wheel having a reduced weight (260 kg). Their experience is focalized on the testing of the limit conditions of the design carried out on full scale test benches. These tests have allowed the verifying of the wheel fatigue resistance in short times. Then a series of these wheels has been put into controlled service by FF.S., the real Y loads and the wear in time have been tested. Now the wheel can be considered as homologated in every respect; they have also been able to limit, to a minimum, the time between the design of the wheel and its putting into service.