Mechanical behavior of a novel rubber floating slab track with honeycomb structure

Train-induced environmental vibration has become an obvious factor restricting the further development of urban rail transit. To alleviate this problem, a novel kind of floating slab track with a Honeycomb Structure Rubber Pad (HSRP) is designed firstly based on the vibration attenuation mechanism of hexagonal and quadrilateral honeycomb structures, respectively. Then, the nonlinear constitutive relationship of the rubber pad is obtained through the uniaxial tensile test. Based on the vehicle-track coupled dynamics, a vehicle-track-tunnel coupled dynamic model is established in ANSYS using APDL language, whose effectiveness is also verified. On this basis, the structural strength and stability of HSRP are explored, and the optimal parameters of HSRP are determined. Finally, the damping effects of HSRP and Ordinary Rubber Pad (ORP) are compared. Results show that the vibration of track system is significantly attenuated by HSRP in the frequency range of 16–100 Hz. The vibration attenuation of the Hexagonal and Quadrilateral Honeycomb Structure Rubber Pads (H HSRP and Q-HSRP) can reach 20 dB and 16 dB respectively, which are better than that of ORP. Besides, the maximum stress of the HSRP and the maximum vertical displacement of the floating slab are 11.62 MPa and 1.78 mm, respectively, which do not exceed the limit values and meet the requirements of structural strength and stability. The optimal wall thicknesses for the hexagonal and quadrilateral honeycomb structures are both 30 mm, and the corresponding optimal side lengths are respectively identified as 0.2 m and 0.26 m. This study is expected to provide theoretical support for the design and application of the rubber floating slab track with a honeycomb structure.