| Summary: | The latest international survey shows that slow computational speed is still a significant issue for air brake models. Fluid dynamics air brake models can be more accurate but are slower in computing speed. Empirical models are reported as effective and more efficient. This article developed a new experimental based empirical air brake model that is more comprehensive and can be used to simulate both pneumatically and electronically controlled air brake systems, as well as locomotive air brake systems and brake systems for radio-based distributed power trains. Multiple functions were used to simulate various characteristics of brake cylinder pressures, which enables the model to capture more details. An activating algorithm was developed to further improve the computational efficiency. Case studies were conducted to compare the simulation results with experimental data. Simulation results and experimental data had good agreements regarding brake delays, force patterns and cylinder pressure amplitudes. The empirical air brake model is about 70 times faster than a fluid dynamics model and 7.4 times faster than real-time.
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