INSTITUTE OF ROLLING STOCK ENGINEERS

INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON HIGH SPEED RAIL TRAVEL:LOW COST SOLUTIONS

New Delhi 29th October and 30th October 2013
Development of an innovative wheel materials for High Speed Service
Andrea GHIDINI, Markus DIENER, Francesco LOMBARDO
Andrea Ghidini, Lucchini RS S.p.A., Lovere (BG), Italy, a.ghidini@LucchiniRS.it
Markus Diener, Laboratory for Nanometallurgy, ETH Zurich, Switzerland, markus.diener@mat.ethz.ch
Francesco Lombardo, Lucchini RS S.p.A., Lovere (BG), Italy, f.lombardo@LucchiniRS.it

Abstract

The paper describes the properties of an innovative steel grade (SUPERLOS) and focuses on the very special
testing methods and requirements designed by Lucchini RS.
The steel is designed to guarantee wheel resistance against wear and in particular Rolling Contact Fatigue (RCF).
The background of this new development was the idea to furnish ER9-like steel with the good toughness
characteristics of ER7 steel grade.
In order to improve the SUPERLOS steel grade for solid wheels, the main aspects of the manufacturing process
need attention to design the material in terms of chemical analysis and heat treatment, in the respect of
environment and safety (sustainability) and taking into account Total Life Cycle requirements.
The application of so-called quality maps, which are a standard in Lucchini RSs steel production process, assures
the safety and performance of the material.
The use of quality indices allows comparing different steel qualities and their performance but also an improvement
of each steel grade can be easily shown in a simple graph.
The results gained over this period of experience are presented and discussed.
The available results, referred to the large population of more than 26'000 wheels distributed in more than twenty
years of service, show in principle an average doubled life collected by wheel manufactured in SUPERLOS steel
versus standard wheel materials.
The wide feedback collected up to now on SUPERLOS in many experiences, including not only light weight and
standard size EN 13262 wheels, but also particular application like increased size tread wheels, is representative
from the statistical point of view and demonstrates SUPERLOS maturity, safety and reliability in service.
Thanks to many successful experiences and to a constant evolution over more than 25 years, SUPERLOS is
today the best seller steel grade for High Speed Service, particularly for very severe environmental and loading
conditions. For these reasons, SUPERLOS is being requested, recognized, appreciated and approved by an
even larger number of railways worldwide.

Keywords

Innovative steel grade, product definition, mechanical properties, quality maps

Forwards

Increasing travel speed is an objective requirement for the development of human relationship and
technology.
Railway has advantages against roads to transport passengers and, sometimes, also against airplane and
High Speed Railways systems in use today are for sure more environmentally friendly than air or road travel and
this is mainly due to:
displaced usage from more environmentally damaging modes of transport;
lower energy consumption per passenger/mileage;
reduced land usage for a given capacity compared to motorways.

Even if speed has always been an indicator of the development of transport, for High Speed Railways systems,
the term "Maximum Speed" has many meanings, because it can reflect:
maximum average speed between two scheduled stops based on the running times in timetables daily
operation;
maximum speed at which a train is allowed to run safely as set by law or policy on a straight section in daily
service with minimal constraints (MOR);
the maximum speed at which an unmodified train is proved to be capable of running;
the maximum speed a specially modified train is proved to be capable of running.

Avoiding description about many Ultra High Speed tests performed specifically for proof record on specially
modified prototype trains up to 500 km/h, that represent opportunities to research and explore wheel-rail dynamics,
structural reliability, innovative materials, new technologies, safety and aerodynamics, from 2011, the fastest
operating conventional trains in Europe have a commercial maximum speed of 320 km/h. The highest commercial
operating speed in the world have been held by China Railway High Speed trains, reaching 350 km/h, even if, due
to high costs and safety risk assessment concerns the top speeds, China has reduced to 300 km/h from July 2011.
The lower conventional limit for High Speed Railway is 200 km/h, that is substantially faster than the highest road
speed limit in most countries, rarely higher than 130 km/h. For journeys that connect city centre to city centre, High
Speed Railways advantage is increased, due to the lower speed limits and frequent traffic jams within most urban
areas. Generally, the longer the journey, the better the time advantage rail over road, if going to the same
destination. While commercial High Speed Trains have maximum speeds slower than jet aircraft, they have
advantages over air travel for short distances, because they usually connect city centre rail stations to each other,
while air transport connects airports outside city centres. There are routes where High Speed Trains have beaten
air transport, so that there are no longer air connections, for example Cologne-Frankfurt in Europe, Nanjing-Wuhan
in China, Tokyo-Nagoya in Japan, etc.

If the rail system is well designed and well operated, severe weather conditions such as heavy snow,
heavy fog, and storms do not affect the journeys, even if the strong environmental and loading conditions or
seasonal phenomena correlated with Fall and Winter can affect the durability of wheels and rolling stocks.
 The management and control of both wheels and rails for the benefit of the overall system have to be able
to increase both the wheel and rail life, while still increasing speed and axle load; as higher is the wheel life, as
lower is the energy consumption per passenger mileage. Unmanaged wheel/rail interface usually leads to:
poor vehicle steering on curves, with high lateral forces and high wheel/rail wear;
vehicle lateral instability on tangent track and high Equivalent Conicity values;
lateral acceleration, with high contact stress and tangential forces;
wheel/rail surface damage, like cracks, spalls, shells, related to wheel/rail interaction forces and the
wheel/rail interface conditions.

Vehicle/track interaction is influenced by many elements of a system, complex solution of which is the
capacity to reduce forces from traffic and increase the strength of infrastructure. This becomes possible only by the
development and application of a wide range of strategies, to improve wheel/rail performance and reduce wheel/rail
wear and RCF. A methodical and integrated study of the wheel/rail system goes through the following main steps:
- development of a wheel/rail interface managements model to better understand and control the parameters
that affect wheel/rail behaviour;
- a suitable wheel/rail profile design, validated by testing in service;
- improved performance standard for wheel and rail.

A wheel/rail interface management model can be applied to predict initiation of RCF and wear patterns.
Worn wheel-rim profiles are usually machined at a special equipped wheel-turning, in order to remove wheel flats,
out of roundness OOR , RCF Clusters, etc. Even with the same wheel steel configuration, different wheel tread
profiles could exhibit different sensitivities to RCF damages, that lead to:
- additional wheelset management, to minimize service disruption from damaged wheels;
- additional depth of cut, in order to remove propagated cracks.

Wheel and rail both suffer from RCF; different maintenance regimes are required to manage both the
wheels and the infrastructure.

Solid wheels for High Speed Service

Railway wheels are usually made of unalloyed or low alloyed steel grades with a high degree of purity.
Tight tolerances for the single alloying elements are desired, in order to assure a low variation of the material
properties from heat to heat.
International standards, such as EN13262, BS 5892-3, AAR M-107/M-208, GOST 10791, define the wheel
steel grades and partly also their manufacturing. Besides the standards, several wheel manufacturers have created
special steel grades for special applications; development work has been in progress for many years.
The European standard EN13262 defines four different steel grades (ER6, ER7, ER8, ER9) which mainly
consist of up to 0.6 wt.% Carbon, up to 0.8 wt.% Manganese and up to 0.4 wt.% Silicon. The microstructure is the
carrier of the above mentioned material properties: fine grain steels with a fine lamellar ferrite and pearlite
microstructure provide an optimal compromise between mechanical properties, wear resistance and thermal
stability. Therefore,
herefore, ferritic pearlitic steels are predominantly used for railway wheels. However, in recent years,
bainitic steels have also been intensively investigated for rolling stock applications.

About wheel design for High Speed Service in the world, the size
si evolution of the wheel head is following
the trend described in Figure 1,, in which we can distinguish three main steps:
- the typical European light weight wheel for high speed service, with a minimum size of the wear head of 25
mm only and a weight of about 270 kg;
- the typical requirement of EN 13262 specification, that requires for solid wheels in Europe, for both
Category 1 and 2, hardness values in the section at 35
3 mm;
- the last generation of some high speed wheels with an higher size of the wear head, till 40 mm, with the
aim to increase the life time of the wheel, increasing the weight up to 310 kg.

Figure 1: Size evolution of the wheel head design for High Speed Service in the world

This is not always true, because 40 kg more for wheel are the 15% more in weight, that needs more energy
consumption per passenger mileage to manage the
th increasing of the wear limit.
A deep Total Life Cycle assessment would be performed considering the energy consumption per
passenger mileage and the optimization of the payload correlated with the three different solutions. An
environmental impact assessment would be able to measure the possible positive or negative impact that the three
proposed solutions for the wheel head design may have on the environment.
Considering that the efficiency
fficiency can be expressed in terms of consumption per unit distance per vehicle or
consumption per unit distance per passenger, High Speed Trains can be considered an efficient mean of transport
for passengers even if their efficiency varies significantly with passenger loads,
loads gradients, maximum speeds,
loading and stopping patterns. Data produced from European projects for estimating
estimat air pollutant emissions
illustrate the different consumption patterns over several track sections: as example, the results show the
consumption for a German High Speed train is around 1933 kWh/km = 68120
120 MJ/km.
MJ/km Data also reflects the
weight of the train per passenger; for example, a double-deck train that uses lightweight wheelsets and materials
which keep axle loads down, reduces damages to the track and also saves energy.

In combination with wheel design improvements, innovative steel grades can contribute to lower the
deadweight and fuel consumption of the vehicles and enable them to carry more payload; the possibility of
increasing the axle load in order to improve the competitiveness of the railways is the subject of lively discussion
today. The weights of railway vehicles can also be cut, while maintaining their payload passengers capacity:
reduced deadweight also reduces energy and maintenance costs.

The quantity of raw materials needed in steelmaking for producing innovative steel grades is the same as that for
standard steels, but less innovative steel will be required for a given mileage, less raw materials will therefore be
needed and the energy consumption will thus also be lower.

The first stage in lowering the wheel weight is to examine the design and simply remove unnecessary
material in the rim, web and hub. The most common procedure would consist of replacing standard materials by
innovative high strength steels, reducing the thickness and thus also lowering the wheel weight.
Innovative wheel steels can offer opportunities for developing entirely new designs that would not have
been possible in the past and the weight can then be reduced further; this will be possible only with the review of
the design criteria in the worldwide standard specifications and with a proper calibration of the necessary wear
limit.
In fact, a lighter wheel with a longer wheel life will require less energy for transporting and more
passengers payload for a longer life time.

In the field of Innovative wheel materials, Lucchini RS is proposing the SUPERLOS as the best seller
steel grade for High Speed Service, particularly for very strong environmental and loading conditions, in search of
longer wheel life.
Inputs by Lucchini RS in the continuous process of evolution of SUPERLOS can be summarized as
follows:
- increasing of mechanical properties in the rim, in order to reach mechanical characteristics and hardness in
the section similar to the hard steel grade ER9 of EN 13262;
- balancing of toughness and ductility quality indicators PLUS, similar to those obtained in the ER7 EN
13262 steel grade.

From the metallurgical point of view, the increasing in size of the wheel head, if not correlated with suited
values of min required hardness, could became one of the main causes of small indirect detrimental effects of the
Gaussian distribution on some quality indicators PLUS of the wheel material, like impact tests Kv and fracture
toughness KQ , as described in Figure 2.
 Figure 2: the shift of the Gaussian distribution of the Quality Indicators PLUS Kv and KQ with the introduction of
not suited hardness requirements while increasing
increasing the wheel head.

In developing the Innovative steel grade, Lucchini RS took into account new criteria, in order to compare
characteristics in terms of resistance to RCF and fracture toughness.
Essentially, the materials Cyclic Yield Strength C.YS is compared against fracture strain. This is usually
done by correlating Cyclic Yield Strength, a cyclic resistance parameter, to a fatigue parameter which is directly
related to the materials ductility, and to a linear elastic fracture mechanics
mechanics parameter. This shows very clearly that
the SUPERLOS steel grade can guarantee an excellent combination of ductility, fracture toughness and cyclic
yield strength, meeting all the requirements
requireme for High Speed applications.

To avoid the development of a crack network and the formation of deep cavities, wheels are generally
reprofiled at regular intervals; but this is expensive. The reprofiling is a quite costly process, but the cost to the
operator is in fact much higher because each reprofiling dramatically reduces the life of the wheel. Apart from that,
reprofiling of damaged wheels is essential for safety reasons, as wheel tread damage caused by RCF can lead to
small parts of the wheel becoming detached, with serious consequences for the vehicle
vehic bearings and for the
infrastructure.

Development of advanced materials solutions needs the cooperation of several people to measure the
possible positive or negative impact on durability of wheel/rail system:
- designers and manufacturers of materials, wheels, rail, trains;
- railways users.
The management and control of wheel material design for the benefit of the Railways system becomes
possible only by the development and application of a wide range of strategies, to improve wheel/rail performance
and
d reduce wheel/rail wear and RCF.
All the actors have to be involved to operate under a set of rules with the primary common aim of achieving
what is best for both wheel and rail.
In order to improve the SUPERLOS steel grade for solid wheels, the main aspects of the manufacturing
process need attention to design of the material, in terms of chemical analysis and heat treatment, in the respect of
Environment and Safety (sustainability) and Total Life Cycle.
 Starting from the Lucchini RS experience, the best evolution of SUPERLOS is now represented by the
material according to I.T. MET R110, developed upon the time, according to Customers requirements.

Mechanical and toughness characteristics required in I.T. MET R110 Rev. 0 are summarized in Table 1.

Obtained
ER7 ER8 SUPERLOS ER9
MECHANICAL CHARACTERISTICS
RIM

M YS 0.2 [MPa] 560 590 640 640

UTS [MPa] 890 940 980 1000
M YS/UTS 0.66 0.63 0.65 0.64
C YS 0.2 [MPa] 415 470 525 505
A [%] 18 17 18 16
Z [%] 56 54 54 50
f 0.82 0.78 0.78 0.69
Kcu A,B,C [J] 27 20 24 18
Kv (-20C [J] 14 11 11 9
KQ room temperature MPam 88 82 82 65
Hardness front rim face [HB] 250 270 290 290
Hardness in the section [HB] Position B at
245 255 268 270
35 mm
Hardness in the section [HB] Position C 265 280 290 290
Hardness in the section [HB] Position A 215 230 255 245
Lf 90% [MPa] 315 340 370 370
M YS 0.2 [MPa] 380 440 500 480
WEB

UTS [MPa] 730 770 850 810

YS/UTS 0.53 0.57 0.59 0.59
A [%] 21 20 21 18
Z [%] 54 50 54 45
Lf 90% [MPa] 260 270 320 310

Table 1: Obtained values of mechanical properties in the rim and web of SUPERLOS, versus EN13262 European
standard steel grades ER7, ER8, ER9

SUPERLOS proposed in I.T. MET R110 Rev.0 is designed by Lucchini RS in order to guarantee
requirements of min. hardness in the section, mechanical characteristics in the rim and on the web similar to those
required for ER9 in EN 13262, and, in the mean time, toughness values and ductility parameters similar to those
required for ER7 in EN 13262.
In summary, ER9 steel grade is considered the harder European material candidate for solid wheels, while
ER7 is the tougher European candidate steel grade in EN 13262.

Importance of monitoring in service

All Railways are in search of longer wheel life and they look for the ultimate life from their wheels and rails,
even if not always they have a suitable control over the maintenance of both wheels and rails. This is partly due to
the traditional structures that Railways operate, that divide rail management from wheel-bogie management.
Lucchini RS feels that the maximization of wheel and rail life can be obtained only when there is a common
aim of achieving what is best for both wheel and rail.
 In many High Speed applications, the wheel life over 2 millions of km has been reached, as described later
in this paper: this has been possible also thanks to the metallurgical designing of the suited wheel materials,
controlling first the whole wheel manufacturing cycle and then the wheel-rail
wheel rail interface in service.
The
he importance of monitoring activities and cooperation with Railways has to be underlined: it is difficult in
fact to predict the improvement that an
a innovative
nnovative material will provide over the traditional one: its only the
feedback from service and the cooperation with Railways that can validate the longer wheel life of the proposed
materials (Figure 3).

Figure 3: Monitoring program has to be designed taking in consideration also the results collected from the
previous service

There is a fundamental premise in Lucchini RS material research for continuous improvement of

innovative
nnovative steel grades, underlying why it employees metallurgists
met and engineers in research and development of
innovative materials.
In order to be able to give
ive an absolute guarantee that innovative
innovative materials will perform better than the
traditional ones for a fleet, the data on wheel wear and reprofiling (cut of material at turning) have to be maintained
over a period of monitoring. These intensive multidisciplinary activities are inspected, measured and validated by
Lucchini RS in cooperative monitoring programs with the Customers.
Each monitoring program
am starts with detailed exchanges with the Customers affairs, problems and or
targets. Metallurgical investigations on the damaged materials related to frequency help Lucchini RS to understand
the main influence, to focus the scope. The evaluation of the results
esults is basic for the recommendation
recomm and
introduction of an innovative
nnovative material grade which will minimize or reduce complete the damages or fulfill the
required target.
Moreover, once the wheels are monitored, we need the control over many factors that could
c influence
wheel life, factors such as braking and acceleration practices, local weather and geographical conditions,
improvement in wheel-rail
rail management, or even if Customer employ new wheel lathe, operators, practices,
equipments, different reprofiling
ing philosophies in terms of cut of material turning.
Further increases in the wheel life are believed to be possible particularly by controlling the wheel
machining cycle,
ycle, within the current limits and the amount of metal that is removed during each cycle,
cycl that
represents the reprofiling philosophy.
For example, if the interval of reprofiling is increased, the material that we have to cut at turning time is
higher, due to sub-surface
surface propagation of tread damages
damag related to a longer period.
 A working group, composed of railroads, wheel-rail-train manufacturers, is suggested to work on ways to
reduce RCF damages, in a continuous improvement process.
Lucchini RS uses to collect feed-back results in a special diagram, that put the reduction in wheel diameter
(amount of metal cut at turning) versus the mileages covered, considering that a very long time is necessary for
validation in service of a proposed material.
This very important tool, that helps the collection of feed-back results and the validation of innovative tested
materials related to a long period, is called Durability Diagram of the wheel, an example of which is visible in
Figure 4.
If we analyze this Durability Diagram of the wheel, we understand that the performances of a wheel
material are influenced firstly by the over mentioned reprofiling philosophy, but then also by a few bad performing
wheels, due to strong machining of RCF clusters, wheel flats, OOR, etc.

0
Durability Diagram of the wheel
-5 Comparison between different trend reprofiling
Reduction in diameter [mm]

-10
-15
-20
Reprofiling every 100000 Km
-25
-30 Reprofiling every 200000 Km
-35
-40
-45
-50
0 100000 200000 300000 400000 500000 600000 700000 800000
Mileage [Km]
Figure 4: Typical diagram of the reduction in thickness [mm] versus the mileage [km], the best way to represent
results from feed back (actual average trend) and to predict the forecast of total life of a wheel, according to a trend
(predictable average trend), that need to be validated (TBV); this very important tool is called Durability Diagram
of the wheel

The diagram in Figure 5 is a second example of Durability Diagram that represents the reduction in
thickness [mm] due to wear and reprofiling versus the mileage [km] of wheels with different behaviour.
Observing in this diagram the actual trend rate (blue line) versus the ideal trend rate (red line), we can
understand that very important for the performances of the wheel life are accidental phenomena, like RCF clusters,
OOR, wheel flat, etc., that can cause waste in diameter during machining operations and compromise the LCC of
the wheel.
For example, in case of a material with wear rate reference of 4-5 mm/100.000 km, effects due to RCF
clusters, wheel flats, OOR on few bad performing wheels, increase the wear rate up to 26 mm/100.000 km., due
to strong machining turning operations to cut a large amount of material thickness, necessary to polish the tread
from RCF/geometrical damages.
 5
0 Durability Diagram Example of wheels affected by OOR
Actual Reprofiling
Reduction in diameter [mm]

-5
Actual trend 26,1 mm/100000
-10 Km
-15 Ideal trend 4,75 mm/100000
Km
-20
-25
-30
-35
-40
0 100000 200000 300000 400000 500000 600000 700000 800000
Mileage [Km]
Figure 5: Example of wheels affected by OOR, with a very strong reprofiling trend rate (26 mm/100.000 km: actual
worst case/bad performing), if compared with the usual one (about 4-5 mm/100.000 km: (actual average
trend/reference).

In fact, the real performances of an innovative material, selected from the theoretical point of view on the
basis of the over mentioned procedure, can give different results in different environmental conditions or with the
application of different reprofiling philosophies.
For these reasons, the material choice can be really validated only by a deep analysis of the feedback from
service, when the amount of results are statistically representative of the average conditions. In service monitoring
and testing activities are the main target, in order to continuously improve Innovative steel grades. Monitoring
activities are very important, but more important is the analysis and interpretation of feed-back measurements.
In fact, the monitoring database is an extremely valuable tool for analyzing wheel performance; however, it
could happen that not all the measured data should usually be fully understood. If we superimpose different
Durability Diagrams of the same Innovative material, as visible in Figure 7, starting from the Zero point, we can
obtain a very useful map, evaluating the range min and max of the actual wear rate for each 100.000 km for that
wheel material.
Many examples of specific cases, in which the application of the Durability Diagram of a wheel material
has been helpful, are well described in the next paragraph.

Comparison and conclusions

Wear rate estimation of High Speed Train wheels has been carried out by Lucchini RS using field
measurements and data elaboration plotted on proper durability diagrams, according to an internal criterion of data
elaboration and standardization, always valid upon the time for past, present and future feedback data re-
elaborations, called: LRS WHEEL DURABILITY ASSESSMENT.
Wheelrail wear is one of the most important problems in the railway industry, especially from the point of
safety, maintenance, and replacement cost.
 10 Average 25 mm head size
Durability Diagram of 22 worldwide Europe 3,82 mm/100.000 Km
0
trains with SUPERLOS wheels Average 30 mm head size
-10
Reduction in diameter [mm]

China+Europe 5,23 mm/100.000

-20 Km
Average 35 mm head size
-30 China+Europe 3,58 mm/100.000
Km
-40 Average 40 mm head size
Chin+Europe 4,40 mm/100.000
-50 Km
Total average China+Europe
-60 4,26 mm/100.000 Km
-70
-80
-90
0 500000 1000000 1500000 2000000 2500000
Mileage [Km]

Figure 6: Durability diagram showing the average values of the 4 world wide families of High Speed wheels
designed with different head size in SUPERLOS and comparison with the Total average of SUPERLOS wheels
worldwide.

To investigate this phenomenon, it is necessary to collect

collect results from service about the wheelrail
interaction, because the simulation results are not tangible enough
enough to explain the wear condition of the railway
system. This new approach has been proposed to determine the wheel wear rate through the field measurements
carried out on 18 European and 4 Chinese
C High Speed train fleets.
In order to have a better understanding
understanding of the full wheel life, Lucchini RS proposes to measure the wear
rates of wheels, as sum of wear on the tread plus turned machined size during each reprofiling and to plot them
versus the mileage in a Durability diagram. This procedure has been expanded
expanded to determine a standard and
general wear criterion, the LRS WHEEL DURABILITY ASSESSMENT, applied upon the time for specific wheels
designs with different head
ead sizes and wheels materials.
To work out a wheel size after a certain mileage, we have to know
ow several parameters:
- the mileage of the High Speed train;
- the wear rate of the wheel material;
- the start size and the scrap size of the wheel;
- the average amount turned (cut off) during maintenance and how regularly it is turned, that is the so called
Reprofiling philosophy.
With these data, we can plot the so called Durability diagrams.

Elaboration of collected data from service has been carried out, after selection of European and Chinese
Chin
High Speed trains in different wheel head sizes:
- the typical European very light weight wheel, designed with a minimized size of the head of 25 mm on the
radial section for the wear limit, fitted on 4 trains;
trai
- the typical light weight wheel, designed with a minimized size of the head of 30 mm on the radial section
se
for the wear limit, fitted on 8 worldwide trains;
 - the typical EN13262 wheels, designed with a radial size of 35 mm for the wear limit, fitted on 4 worldwide
trains;
- some wheels of the last generation, designed with a higher size of the head of 40 mm on the radial section
for the wear limit, fitted on 7 worldwide trains.

In the Durability
rability diagram of Figure 6 we have elaborated the data of feed-bac
back results for the 4 families of
wheels designed with different head size (25, 30, 35, 40 mm) and calculated the average values of this population
of 18 European and 4 Chinese High Speed Trains.

If we consider the grey line representative of the Total worldwide

worldwide average behaviour of SUPERLOS, the
results can be summarized as follows (Table 2):
- average wear rate of 22 trains equipped with SUPERLOS = 4.26 mm/100.000km (-47%
( if referred to the
traditional wheel materials worldwide), with a reprofiling interval of 320.000 km (average);
- average total wheel life of 22 trains equipped with SUPERLOS = 1.840.000 km (+50% if referred to the
traditional wheel material worldwide);
- the families of wheels that behave better than the grey line representative for the Total worldwide average
behaviour of SUPERLOS are those with 35 mm of head size (typical head size proposed by EN13262
specification) and those with 25 mm of head size (typical head size of the very light weight High Speed
wheels);
- the families of wheels that result worst than the grey average line are those of 30 mm and 40 mm in head
size.
The low performing behaviour of the population of wheels with 30 mm in head size is probably due to the
fact that they are comprehensive of trains circulating on mountains lines.

Table 2:: summary of data collected for the Durability diagram

If we compare the average behaviour of the wheels with 35 mm in head size (according to EN 13262)
versus the new generations of wheels with 40 mm in head size, we can remark the following surprising and not
easy to explain result: wheels designed according to EN 13262 criteria (35 mm) show a much better behaviour not
only
nly in terms of wear rating, but also in terms of total wheel life, if compared to 40 mm high head wheels.
 In order to understand this result, some deeper considerations in terms of environmental assessment
should be carried out together with involved
involve specialists. In any case, we believe that higher weight of wheels
means:
- higher energy consumption in manufacturing and in service, with a consequence also in reduction of
passengers payload;
- extreme manufacturing processes, due to a new calibration between
between hardness in the rim section (wear limit
40 mm) and toughness requirements copied from EN 13262 (designed by EN for 35 mm in wear limit).

The results show that the total wheel life is not always proportional to the head size of the wheel,
independent of the material choice.
The low level behaviour of the population of the high head wheels (40 mm) induces to better examine the
importance to design a wheel according to environmental assessment, probably already well represented by EN
13262 European specification
ecification criteria, suited designed by the European railways specialists.
In Figure 7, the Durability diagram for the Total average of worldwide High
Hig Speed Trains equipped with
SUPERLOS wheels versus the Total average of worldwide High Sped Trains equipped with Standard ER7/8/9
High Speed wheels is shown.
The available results, referred to the large population of more than
than 26'000 wheels distributed
distribute in more than
twenty years of service, show in principle an average doubled wheel life collected by SUPERLOS versus
standard wheel materials, considering that the Durability diagrams from LRS data base are partly actual average
trend and partly are predictable
ctable average trend.

10 Durability diagram worldwide average

0 SUPERLOS versus Standard material Total average
China+Europe
-10
Reduction in diameter [mm]

SUPERLOS 4,26
-20 mm/100.000 Km
-30 Total average
-40 China+Europe Standard
8,04 mm/100.000 Km
-50
-60
-70
-80
-90
0 500000 1000000 1500000 2000000
Mileage [Km]

Figure 7: Durability diagram representing the worldwide average of SUPERLOS wheels versus the Standard
ER7/8/9 High Speed wheels

back results collected up to now on SUPERLOS family in many

As summarized in Figure 8, the feed-back
experiences are representative, from the statistical point of view, including not only light weight and standard size
EN 13262 wheels, but also increased size tread wheels, demonstrate SUPERLOS family maturity, safety and
reliability. Thanks to many successful experiences, SUPERLOS is for Lucchini RS the best selling innovative
steel grade for solid wheels, particularly for High Speed and extreme environmental and loading applications.
For those reasons, SUPERLOS is requested, recognized, appreciated and approved by a large number
of railways worldwide.