Modular Truss Subframe for Rail Vehicles

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Solution Overview

Problem

Conventional rail vehicle bases are heavy, requiring high material usage and maintenance efforts, limiting their maximum loading capacity and efficiency, and often necessitate specific, costly device parts for production and repair.

Innovation Solution

A modular base frame designed with spatial half-timbered structures and standardized components, featuring inclined half-timbered profiles and scalable resilience, which reduces weight while maintaining high load-bearing capacity, allowing for easier assembly, maintenance, and increased loading capacity without significant weight gain.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Strength

If conventional underframes are designed with solid beam structures to ensure load-bearing capacity, then strength is improved, but weight increases significantly

Engineering Contradiction:

Improveload-bearing capacityVSAvoidtare weight

Core Design Contradiction:

StrengthVSWeight of moving object

Solution Approach 1:

The underframe is divided into modular components: longitudinal beams, cross beams, and truss structures that can be independently manufactured and assembled. This segmentation allows optimization of each component's weight-strength ratio while maintaining overall structural integrity

Inventive Principle:

Principle #1Segmentation

Solution Approach 2:

The underframe combines different structural forms (solid beams for longitudinal support, truss structures for transverse support) to create a composite structure that optimizes weight distribution and load-bearing efficiency across different directions

Inventive Principle:

Principle #40Composite materials

2Manufacturing precision

If type-specific fixture components are used for manufacturing underframes, then manufacturing precision is improved, but device complexity and production time increase

Engineering Contradiction:

Improveassembly precisionVSAvoidfixture component variety

Core Design Contradiction:

Manufacturing precisionVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

Standardized fixture components are designed to serve multiple functions and be compatible with different underframe configurations. The same types of fixtures can accommodate various beam dimensions and arrangements, reducing the total number of unique components needed

Inventive Principle:

Principle #6Universality (Multi-functionality)

Solution Approach 2:

Instead of creating new fixtures for each underframe type, the system adjusts parameters of existing fixtures (such as positioning distances, clamping forces, or attachment points) to accommodate different specifications, maintaining precision without increasing complexity

Inventive Principle:

Principle #35Parameter changes

3Adaptability or versatility

If manual welding is used to assemble underframe components, then manufacturing flexibility is improved, but productivity decreases and labor costs increase

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvemanufacturing flexibilityVSAvoidassembly speed

Core Design Contradiction:

Adaptability or versatilityVSProductivity

Solution Approach 1:

The manufacturing system transitions from static manual welding to dynamic automated welding processes that can adapt to different configurations through programmable control, maintaining flexibility while dramatically increasing assembly speed and consistency

Inventive Principle:

Principle #15Dynamics

4Strength

If conventional underframes are designed for maximum load capacity, then strength is improved, but adaptability to different loading requirements decreases

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvemaximum load capacityVSAvoidscalability

Core Design Contradiction:

StrengthVSAdaptability or versatility

Solution Approach 1:

The underframe is constructed from standardized modular components that can be selectively combined in different quantities and configurations. This allows the same basic component set to serve multiple load capacity requirements through simple repetition or omission of modules

Inventive Principle:

Principle #1Segmentation

Solution Approach 2:

The system enables adjustment of load capacity by changing parameters such as the number of cross beams, spacing of longitudinal beams, or selection of beam dimensions, rather than requiring fundamentally different structural designs for different capacity levels

Inventive Principle:

Principle #35Parameter changes

Data Source

PatentEP3708453B1Subframe for vehicles and vehicle

Publication Date: 2022.10.12 SCHWEIZISCHE BUNDESBAHNEN SBB

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AI summary

The underframe (1), which is intended for a vehicle (10), in particular a rail vehicle or a truck, comprises a frame structure aligned along a longitudinal axis (x), which has two outer support structures (2A, 2B) connected to each other by a connecting structure (2C). According to the invention, the outer support structures (2A, 2B) are constructed as planar or three-dimensional truss structures, which have serially connected truss profiles (24, 25) that connect an upper longitudinal beam (21) and a lower longitudinal beam (22) such that each pair of adjacent truss profiles (24, 25), together with the upper or lower longitudinal beam (21; 22), forms a triangle (D1A1, D2A1; D1A2, D2A2) with three nodes.