United States Department of Transportation
i
Understanding the Splitting and Bursting Failure of Concrete Crossties
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2018-08-01
[PDF-1.16 MB]
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Alternative Title:Research Results
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NTL Classification:AGR-INFRASTRUCTURE-Railroads;NTL-RAIL TRANSPORTATION-RAIL TRANSPORTATION;NTL-RAIL TRANSPORTATION-Rail Safety;
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Abstract:Under the sponsorship of the Federal Railroad Administration, finite element (FE) analyses were conducted at the Volpe National Transportation Systems Center (Volpe Center) between 2016 and 2017 to understand the contributing factors to the concrete tie splitting/bursting failure mode. This was carried out by simulating the responses of concrete ties to the pretension release process during production and dynamic loads in service. The Volpe Center used the bond and transfer length test data from Kansas State University (KSU) to calibrate and/or validate the FE models, including an elastoplastic bond model that characterized the interactions between various prestressing steel tendons and concrete. FE analyses of the given concrete tie designs identified low concrete release strength, along with the underdeveloped steel-concrete bond during production, as leading contributing factors to the bursting or splitting failure in some well-known cases. In addition, manufactured surface indentations in some prestressing wires, indented for improving the transfer length performance, can make a concrete tie more prone to bursting/splitting failure when combined with the low concrete release strength underdeveloped bond condition. ongoing work is aimed at recommending and incorporating requirements related to these factors into the industrial standards such as the American Railway Engineering and Maintenance-of-Way Association (AREMA) Tie Manual.
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