Application deadline 8 May, 2007.
Reference number 2007/52
CHARMEC - CHAlmers Railway MEChanics - is a national centre of excellence in railway mechanics established in 1995 by NUTEK (now VINNOVA). CHARMEC is currently supported by Chalmers and Banverket and by the Industrial Interests Group comprising Abetong Teknik, Bombardier Transportation, Faiveley Transport, Green Cargo, Interfleet Technology, Lucchini Sweden, SJ, SL Technology, SweMaint and voestalpine Bahnsysteme.
The long-term CHARMEC research and knowledge bank aims at reducing the railway's costs for production, environment, operation and maintenance while improving safety, reliability and transport quality. Research is carried out within the six programme areas: Interaction of train and track, Vibrations and noise, Materials and maintenance, Systems for monitoring and operation, Parallel EU projects, and Parallel special projects.
The CHARMEC Centre of Excellence (information on the department involved in the projects is given at the bottom of this page) is seeking five new PhD students to start in the spring/summer of 2007. The research will be conducted within the five projects described below.
PhD Project 1: Thermal capacity of tread braked railway wheels
The thermal capacity of the wheels is a limiting factor for railway tread braking systems. The PhD project will continue previous CHARMEC research work on railway tread braking. The focus will be on the thermal capacity of wheels for metro applications where frequent stop-braking occurs. Mathematical modelling, rig experiments and field tests will be included. The project should develop methods and provide data that can form a basis for future design guidelines for assessing the thermal capacity of tread braked wheels. The project should identify those phenomena which put limits on the capacity of the tread braking system, outline methods for determining such limits and, finally, quantify the limits.
Thermal image of tread braked railway wheel.
The project requires a PhD-student with a good knowledge of FE-analysis and also an interest in experimental work.
PhD Project 2: Identification of wheel-rail contact forces with sensitivity and quality assessment
The project focuses on the forces in the wheel-rail contact, which are difficult to measure by direct methods. The purpose of the proposed project is to apply (and further develop) a strategy that developed within a recent CHARMEC project. As key tasks you will thereby assess an existing all-experiment based identification method for vertical wheel-rail contact forces by using the proposed method and existing measurements.
FE model of an X2 trailer wheelset including brake discs. Shape of radial eigenmode with two nodal diameters is shown.
In particular, you will study the effects of modelling and regularization on the estimated forces and propose a design of new experimental setups for accurate evaluation of the wheel-rail contact forces in the vertical, lateral and longitudinal directions. The project requires a PhD-student with a good knowledge of FE-analysis and structural dynamics.
Locations of 16 strain gauges used to measure forces in an existing measurement setup.
PhD Project 3: Thermal impact on surface initiated rolling contact fatigue of railway wheels
Railway wheels operate under extreme conditions. The loading between a wheel and the rail may equal the weight of ten automobile cars applied on a contact patch the size of a small coin. In addition, high friction occurs on curves and during traction/braking. In addition, tread braking will heat the surface material of the wheel by several hundred degrees. Naturally, wheels are prone to cracking.
As a PhD-student you will investigate under which conditions and how fast cracking will occur. In particular the influence of thermal loading will be investigated.
The project requires a PhD-student skilled and interested in numerical simulations. In particular, knowledge of FE-analysis, fatigue analysis and material mechanics is valuable.
PhD Project 4: Material anisotropy and rolling contact fatigue of rails and switches
The steel material in railheads is anisotropic. This is a well known fact, but there is little knowledge on how this anisotropy evolves and which effect it will have.
As a PhD-student you will investigate the evolution of anisotropy, and the effect it will have on the initiation and growth of fatigue cracks in the railhead. The investigations will mainly feature numerical simulations.
The project requires a PhD-student with a good knowledge of FE-analysis and constitutive modelling.
PhD Project 5: Wear impact on rolling contact fatigue of railway rails
The two dominating causes of rail deterioration are wear and fatigue cracking. Due to the severe loading on the rail surface and the high number of load repetitions, proper modelling of these mechanisms is crucial for determining the overall deterioration of the rail. To complicate matters, these phenomena interact strongly. Wear will remove small cracks, but also alter the wheel-rail contact geometry and the residual state of stress in the wheel.
As a PhD-student you will investigate the effect of wear on cracking of railway rails. In addition, also the problem of how to update the rail profile in numerical simulations will be considered. Rail wear is a consequence of millions of wheel passes. It is not possible to simulate each subsequent wheel pass in a standard manner. Instead one wishes to compute the response only for a few wheel passes and then extrapolate the results for a very large number of similar passes. The key task within this framework is to develop an efficient algorithm regarding computational efficiency and reliable results.
The project requires a PhD-student with a good knowledge of FE-analysis, fatigue analysis and constitutive modelling.
In each of the five projects, the doctoral student will have a main supervisor and associate supervisor(s). CHARMEC's network at the University and in the industry will be available to the doctoral students. The projects include applied research of industrial relevance. You will present your research at scientific seminars and conferences, to the CHARMEC Board and in reference groups. The projects require that you develop an ability to extract industrially useful results from your research and to communicate these, verbally and in writing, in Swedish and in English. This is in addition to the general requirement of good basic knowledge within your chosen research field.
You will be employed as a doctoral student by Chalmers and will receive a salary according to current salary agreements. A maximum of 20% of your working time will be devoted to duties at the department in question, mainly teaching of undergraduate courses. The remaining time will be devoted to your own research education, where the aim is to complete your PhD examination within 5 years (nominal time without department duties is 4 years).
A suitable background is a Master of Science (Swedish: civilingenjör) in mechanical engineering, engineering physics or civil engineering with emphasis on computational work. Knowledge of the Swedish language is desirable but not a requirement.
More information about the doctoral programmes is available here >>>
For more information contact
General: Professor Roger Lundén, +46 31 772 1511, roger.lunden@chalmers.se
PhD project 1: Professor Roger Lundén, +46 31 772 1511, roger.lunden@chalmers.se
PhD project 2: Dr Fredrik Larsson, +46 31 772 1979, fredrik.larsson@chalmers.se
PhD project 3: Docent Anders Ekberg, +46 31 772 3480, anders.ekberg@chalmers.se
PhD project 4: Docent Magnus Ekh, +46 31 772 3479, magnus.ekh@chalmers.se
PhD project 5: Dr Fredrik Larsson, +46 31 772 1979, fredrik.larsson@chalmers.se
Head of Department; Professor Per Lövsund +46 (0)31-772 3642, per.lovsund@chalmers.se
The application should include:
- An application of a maximum of one A4 page containing your specific qualifications for the position
- Attested copies of education certificates, including grade reports and other documents
- Your full Curriculum Vitae
- A description of previous work experience
- Letters of recommendation from previous employers
We welcome your application with CV and supporting documents, marked with reference number 2007/52, no later than 8 May 2007. Please send applications to:
Address
Registrar
Chalmers University of Technology
SE-412 96 Göteborg
E-mail: registrator@chalmers.se
Tel exch: +46 31 7721000
Fax Registrar: +46 31 7724922
Union representatives
SACO Jan Lindér, ST Monika Orrbacke, SEKO Ralf Berndtsson
More information about CHARMEC is available here >>>
Please visit CHARMEC's website >>>
The Department of Applied Mechanics runs study programmes and research in the areas of vehicle design, mechanical engineering and building and construction mechanics. International research is conducted within seven research Divisions, often in close cooperation with national and international industries. The research covers both fundamental and applied problems. The five doctoral positions described above will be placed at the Division of Dynamics and at the Division of Material and Computational Mechanics.
http://chalmersnyheter.chalmers.se/chalmers03/english/eng_vacanciesarticle.jsp?article=9013
If you want to receive academic resources in your e-mail on daily basis, please subscribe to 10resources-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.
If you want to publish your announcement, please send it to riliescu2000@yahoo.com.
