Abstract:In design of light railcar used freely supported beam, the cast steel pedestals will bear complex loads, which include weight, acceleration and wind, etc. Because of pedestals' peculiarity and complexity, the strength of the pedestals play an important role in safety of light railcar. So it's necessary to analyze their stress and deformation in order to insure safety of light railcar. Up to now, finite element analysis is still the most effective means. By studying cast steel pedestal with finite element method, 3-D finite element models of fixed and kinetic pedestals were built, and the loads and boundary condition of pedestals were analyzed. By means of finite element analysis software, the contact and von mises stresses were obtained and deformation were resolved. As a result of analysis, the tow of pedestal can fulfill requirement of use in light railcar, the contact stress and von mises stress are not exceeded limit stress strength of materials. There is enough static strength for the structures of pedestals. For verifying theoretical analysis result, the fatigue test was carried out, with examining the testing points locating on the pedestals, the stress and deformation data were measured. By comparing between theoretical analysis and test data, the experimental results show calculated and testing results can meet the case well which assure the reliability of finite element analysis. But in the result, there are differences in deformations of them. The reason may be that boundary conditions and loads are not same between analysis and experiment.