Rapid and Easily Applicable Procedure for Full-Scale Laboratory Tests of Ballastless Slab Tracks

Abstract

Increasing demand for high speed railway lines necessitates reducing construction and maintenance costs. Accordingly, RC slab tracks are preferred due to their advantages such as being almost maintenance free and supplying uniform support conditions. However, new testing procedures are required for the performance evaluation of the slab tracks to identify possible failure modes which may not be observed in numerical analyses. Although there are some procedures in the literature, there still is no consensus on loading intensity, shape, frequency, or number of cycles. A testing procedure that greatly decreases experimental costs was adopted for the design approval tests of precast RC slab tracks. The procedure was evaluated experimentally through full-scale laboratory tests of intact and intentionally damaged specimens. The study demonstrated that the proposed testing procedure reduces experimental costs and identifies the mechanical properties of slab tracks.