Data-driven approach to study the polygonization of high-speed railway train wheel-sets using field data of China’s HSR train

•Seasonality has significant impact on reliability of China high-speed rail train.•Environmental factor exerts more impact than mechanism factor on reliability.•Survival analysis combined with Bayesian methods is applied in data analysis.•A case study on field data intends to improve practical maintenance efficiency.•Optimized maintenance interval is given by mean time to failure estimation.