Behaviours of flow and flow-induced noise generated from leading bogie region of high-speed train using flow-through cowcatcher

Abstract

This study introduces a novel flow-through cowcatcher with integrated inlet and outlet channels as an aerodynamic noise mitigation strategy for the nose car of a high-speed train. The wall-adapting local eddy-viscosity large-eddy simulation (WALE-LES) combined with the Ffowcs Williams-Hawkings (FW-H) acoustic analogy approach is employed to evaluate its impact on the aerodynamic and aeroacoustic characteristics of the leading bogie region. Compared with the conventional closed cowcatcher, results show that the flow-through structure suppresses the flow separation, promotes more stable vortex evolution within the bogie cavity, and reduces the spatial extent of high-amplitude wall pressure fluctuations up to 40%, mitigating effectively the generation of aerodynamic noise. Semi-anechoic wind tunnel experiments validate the simulation results and demonstrate that the sound pressure levels at the far-field observers decrease by 0.4–0.6 dB(A) with the flow-through cowcatcher applied underneath the nose car. The dominant sound source around the leading bogie region is shrunk with intensity reduced about 1.0 dB(A). These findings confirm the effectiveness of the flow-through cowcatcher in reducing the aerodynamic noise produced from the leading bogie region, providing both theoretical insight and engineering guidance for structural optimization and low-noise design of the nose car in a high-speed train.

Keywords

high-speed train / leading bogie / flow-through cowcatcher / aerodynamic noise / flow control

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Central South University