Selection of tools and development of a software system for predicting lateral wear of rails

The safety of cargo and passenger transportation by rail is a key issue for the rail industry. Transportation safety is primarily related to the quality of the railway track on which transportation is carried out. During the operation of the railway track, the problem of lateral wear of rails in curves arises, which leads to the unsuitability of the operation of rails in curves and the need to replace them. Previously, the issue of predicting the lateral wear of rails was solved by carrying out all calculations by the operator in the MS Excel environment. This paper proposes to solve this problem systematically: to choose a tool and develop a software system for predicting the lateral wear of rails in curves for a certain period of time depending on the traffic load. In addition to prediction of the lateral wear of rails, the developed software system will be able to give recommendations on the maximum allowable speeds on rails with lateral wear of more than 15 mm and on the replacement of rails as a matter of priority. As a result, the developed software system will automate all calculations for predicting the lateral wear of rails and generate output documentation at the request of the operator, based on which the director will make decisions on the replacement of specific rails in order to improve transportation safety.