Dowel Behavior of Rebars in Small Concrete Block for Sliding Slab Track on Railway Bridges

In recent years, several studies have investigated the sliding slab track for railway bridges. In the design of sliding slab tracks, one of the most important considerations is to evaluate the shear capacity of the lateral supporting concrete blocks in which dowel rebars are embedded. The predictions of the dowel behavior of rebars by existing models are considerably different. Therefore, in this study, the actual dowel behavior of the rebars embedded in a small concrete block was extensively investigated through experiments. Test variables were concrete compressive strength, dowel rebar diameter and yield strength, specimen thickness, and dowel rebar spacing. Existing model predictions were considerably different from test results. The maximum dowel force increased as concrete compressive strength and dowel rebar diameter increased, while it did not increase considerably with other test variables. Unlike in existing models, the shear slip at the maximum dowel force decreased as the dowel rebar diameter increased. Existing models significantly underestimated the maximum dowel force of the dowel rebars with small diameters and overestimated it for the dowel rebars with large diameters. This work can be useful for developing a more rational model to represent the actual dowel behavior of the rebars embedded in small concrete blocks.

Rail-Structure Interaction Analysis of Sliding Slab Track on Bridge

Continuous welded rail (CWR) on a bridge structure typically experiences a large amount of additional longitudinal axial forces due to longitudinal rail-structure (or track-bridge) interaction under temperature change and train vertical and traction/braking load effect. In order to reduce the additional axial forces, a special type of fastener, such as zero longitudinal restraint (ZLR) and reduced longitudinal restraint (RLR) or rail expansion joint (REJ) should be applied. Sliding slab track system is developed to reduce the effect of rail-structure interaction through the application of a low-frictional sliding layer between slab track and bridge structure. This study presents a track-bridge interaction analysis of the sliding slab track and compares them with conventional fixed slab track on bridges. Various types of span length and longitudinal profiles of bridges are considered in the analysis, which also include multiple continuous spans and extra-dosed bridges. The analysis found that the sliding slab track can reduce the additional axial forces of the continuous welded rail from 80% to 90%, and the difference is more significant for long and continuous span bridge. By the application of the sliding slab track, the use of any other special type of rail fasteners or REJ can be avoided. In addition, span length will not be restricted by the rail-structure interaction effect in planning the railway bridge layout. Continuous span bridge has been usually avoided for railway bridges, but it is preferred for the application of the sliding slab track because the interaction effect can mostly be removed. A continuous span bridge usually has an economical cross-section for the bridge girder, pier and foundation and better dynamic characteristics compared to simple span bridge, and its application eventually will reduce the construction cost of the railway infrastructure.