Stabilization control of hunting motion of railway vehicle wheelset using gyroscopic damper

A railway wheelset experiences the problem of hunting motion above a critical speed, which is known as a flutter-type self-excited oscillation owing to a nonconservative contact force. In this study, a stabilization control method is proposed for the hunting motion in a simple wheelset model, i.e. a fundamental two-degrees-of-freedom model with respect to the lateral and yawing motions of the wheelset. Using the theory of linear eigenvalue analysis it is shown that a gyroscopic damper is effective in increasing critical speed for the hunting motion. Experiments were conducted using a simple apparatus with a roller rig, and results show the validity of the gyroscopic damper for the stabilization of hunting motion.