creep of rail | railway engineering

Creep of rails:-

t

he longitudinal movement of rails, in a track is known as creep of rails
It is defined as the longitudinal movement of rails with respect to sleepers in a track.

Causes of creep:

Wave motion of trains. 

 — Expansion and contraction of rails due to variation in temperature.

— Due to starting, accelerating, slowing down (decelerating) and stopping of trains.

 — Rail deflection under the moving loads from the wheels

 — Heavy traffic in one direction

 — Greater on curves

 — Old rails have more creep

 — More with steep gradient

 — Poor maintenance of track

Effects of Creep:

Expansion gap is reduced, buckling of track take place.

 — Sleepers are moved out of a square.

 — Crossing points get disturbed.

— Rail joints are opened, stresses are set up in fish plates and bolts.

— Movement of switches is made difficult

— Smashing of fish plate, bolts, bending of bars, kinks at joints

Prevention of creep:

Pulling back the rails

— Provision of Anchors

— Use of steel sleepers

— Efficient and proper maintenance

Anchors and anti-creepers:

Creep can be checked by using Anchor and Anti-creepers.

 —Anchors are fastenings which are fixed to the sleepers at foot of rails

 —Anchors are fixed at come required intervals in the rails

 —They depend up on the traffic, curves points, crossings

Anchors and anti-creepers: