• 한국자동차공학회논문집
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• 제13권2호
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• pp.1-9
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• 2005

An end beam is one of the most important structural members supporting uncovered freight under in-service loading. In general, it needs to endure over 25 years. However fatigue fracture has occurred at dynamic stress concentration location of the end beam because user's specifications demanded high speed and vehicle manufacturer made the uncovered freight car with comparatively low strength and stiffness. For durability analysis, finite element analysis is performed to evaluate the problem of uncovered freight structure and local strain. The uncovered freight car was operated on actual problematic railroad line to measure dynamic stress versus time history on the critical part from which a crack is initiated often. Rainflow cycle counting method was used to estimate fatigue damage at dangerous area under operating condition. Therefore, this study shows that analytical fatigue life at the end beam can be predicted on the basis of S-N curve and structure analysis and has a fairly good correlation with experimental fatigue life.