OPTIMIZATION ANALYSIS OF ENERGY-ABSORBING STRUCTURES IN SUBWAY TRAIN

An energy-absorbing structure from the front end of subway vehicle was studied to promote crashworthiness during a collision by increasing energy-absorption and decreasing collision force in this paper. A size optimization problem was solved using the non-linear programming by quadratic Lagrangian algorithm by integrating collision simulation code PAM-CRASH in the multidiscipline optimization platform Isight. Moreover, the energy-absorbing structure was redesigned using the topology optimization in OptiStruct module to promote its deformation efficiency. It is indicated that combination of size and topology optimization techniques aforementioned is feasible and efficient in promoting the crashworthiness performance of energy-absorbing structure and providing more safety allowance for passengers.