Abstract
A new method to determine the dynamic interaction between the train and track has been presented. The train and the track are considered as different subsystems. The subsystems are solved independently assuming no contact force exists, and the overall solution of the system is obtained enforcing displacement compatibility and dynamic force equilibrium equations. The proposed method solves the interface contact forces and the displacements of the contact points explicitly. The method proposed avoids iterative methods to enforce compatibility and equilibrium conditions as devised by other authors. The proposed method is also computationally efficient to the methods devised by different authors when the system is solved as one system since smaller systems are solved at a time and there is no need to update structural matrices at every time step. The numerical examples presented show the accuracy and efficiency of the proposed algorithm.
