Research on the Influence Law of Size and Shape of Rail Crack on Alternating Current Field Measurement Signal

doi:10.3901/JME.2025.18.038

Abstract

Abstract: Long-term rolling contact between rail and wheel can easily cause rail fatigue cracks, leading to serious problems such as rail surface peeling and even rail fracture. Therefore, it is of great significance to carry out the detection and quantitative characterization of crack size, propagation depth and crack shape. A rail crack detection system with array sensors based on the alternating current field measurement (ACFM) technology was designed and built. The influence law of different crack depths, lengths and shapes (Cluster-shaped, Y-shaped and W-shaped) on the ACFM signal were studied by using the contour color map of the detection signal. The influence mechanism of the crack shape on the ACFM signal was analyzed. The research results indicate that as the length and depth of cracks increase, the valley value of the B_x signal decreases, and the B_z signal shows more and more obvious characteristic of two extreme values. The area of the defect ring in the butterfly plot gradually increases, it indicates that the magnetic field disturbance caused by cracks gradually increases. Compared with the B_x signal, the B_z signal is more sensitive to changes of crack length and depth. As the number of clustered cracks increases, the signal intensity of B_x and B_z around the cracks gradually increases. And, the line connecting the peak position of B_x signal can reflect the direction of cracks. For the W-shaped crack, the B_x signal shows three extreme values, the B_z signal shows symmetrically distributed extreme values. For the Y-shaped crack, the B_x signal shows six extreme values, the B_z signal shows four extreme values. The contour color map of the ACFM signal from array sensors can be used to identify and characterize the complex shapes of cracks.

Key words: rail cracks, ACFM, crack size, crack shape, array sensors

CLC Number:

U216

LIN Qiang, LIU Xing, TIAN Haidong, WANG Wenjian, DING Haohao, LIU Qiyue, GUO Jun. Research on the Influence Law of Size and Shape of Rail Crack on Alternating Current Field Measurement Signal[J]. Journal of Mechanical Engineering, 2025, 61(18): 38-49.

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