Crash Stability Analysis and Multi-Objective Optimization of Oriented Energy-Absorbing Structure for Locomotive

Abstract

When the train collides, the anti-climbing energy-absorbing structure suffers huge impact force, which results in obvious deformation and energy absorption. Through the study of collision test and accident, it is found that the anti-climbing energy-absorbing structure produces obvious instability phenomenon when the collision occurs, and the lateral head shaking or vertical head nodding movement is likely to lead obvious buckling deformation of the energy absorption structure, which greatly reduces the structural energy absorption effect and increases the risk of train climbing. The guide structure of the anti-climbing structure affects the deformation and energy absorption to a certain extent. Therefore, this paper establishes the finite element model of the trolley with anti-climbing energy absorption structure, and the model is verified by experiments. Based on the verified finite element model, the effects of the diameter [Formula: see text] and thickness [Formula: see text] of the guide tube, the gap [Formula: see text] between the inner and outer guide tube and the vertical offset [Formula: see text] of the trolley center of mass on the energy absorption, vertical and horizontal stability of the structure were studied. The results show that the trolley center of mass offset [Formula: see text], the diameter [Formula: see text] and the wall thickness [Formula: see text] of the guide tube have a large influence on the deformed energy absorption mode of the anti-climbing energy absorption structure and the stability of the trolley. In order to investigate the influence of the trolley center of mass offset [Formula: see text], the diameter [Formula: see text] and wall thickness [Formula: see text] of the guide tube on the anti-climbing energy absorption structure, the response surface (RS) model of the design of experiment (DOE) was used together with the finite element model (FEM) calibrated by the test. Finally, based on the established RS model, the multi-objective genetic algorithm (MOGA) is used for multi-objective optimization design. The results show that the amount of energy absorbed (EA) by the anti-climbing energy absorbing structure, and the mass of the guide tube [Formula: see text] cannot be optimized simultaneously. Finally, the optimization results provide a good design matrix for obtaining anti-climbing energy absorbing structures and recommendations with excellent performance in terms of crashworthiness of locomotive.