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LWR and CWR: What Are The Common Lengths of Rails?

LWR and CWR What are the common lengths of rails? The most common length for BG rails is 13m(42’8”) although double-length rails (26m, 85’4”) are also seen. Welded rail sections are of two types: Short Welded Rail or SWR which consists of just two or three rails welded together and Long Welded Rail or LWR which covers anything longer. (In the past, there was a distinction made between LWR and Continuously Welded Rail, or CWR, based on the length—in CWR, the total length was 0.75km or more. The

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Rajpoot Dannyal
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273 views1 page

LWR and CWR: What Are The Common Lengths of Rails?

LWR and CWR What are the common lengths of rails? The most common length for BG rails is 13m(42’8”) although double-length rails (26m, 85’4”) are also seen. Welded rail sections are of two types: Short Welded Rail or SWR which consists of just two or three rails welded together and Long Welded Rail or LWR which covers anything longer. (In the past, there was a distinction made between LWR and Continuously Welded Rail, or CWR, based on the length—in CWR, the total length was 0.75km or more. The

Uploaded by

Rajpoot Dannyal
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Download as docx, pdf, or txt
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1. 8. BEARING PLATES • Bearing plates are cast iron or steel plates placed in between the F.

F.F rail and wooden sleepers of


a railway track. • F.F. rails if fixed directly on wooden sleepers sink in the sleeper due to the heavy loads of trains and thus
loosen the spikes. • To overcome this difficulty bearing plates are used under F.F. rails to distribute the load over a wider
area and bring the intensity of pressure within limit.
2. 9. • Bearing plates give the required 1 in 20 inward slope to the rail directly and no adzing* is required in the wooden
sleeper. • These are fixed to sleepers by spikes.
3. 10. ADVANTAGES • Following are the advantages of bearing plates: • (i) They distribute the loads to wider area and
prevent sinking of the rail to the sleeper. • (ii) They avoid adzing of sleepers. • (iii) They enable the spikes to remain tight
and require less maintenance. • (iv) Bearing plates prevent the widening of gauge on curves. • (v) Bearing plates increase
the overall stability of the track. • (vi) They prevent the destruction of the sleeper due to rubbing action of the rail.
4. 11. DISADVANTAGES • Following are the disadvantages of bearing plates: • (i) When the bearing plates become loose
due to settlement of ballast, moisture is likely to enter between the sleepers and plates, causing sleepers to wear. • (ii)
When any spike is damaged and it is required to be redriven at another place, all other spikes of the bearing plates have
to be removed, which will reduce the holding power of the spikes

LWR and CWR

What are the common lengths of rails?

The most common length for BG rails is 13m(42’8”) although double-length rails (26m, 85’4”) are also seen. Welded rail
sections are of two types: Short Welded Rail or SWR which consists of just two or three rails welded together and Long
Welded Rail or LWR which covers anything longer. (In the past, there was a distinction made between LWR and
Continuously Welded Rail, or CWR, based on the length—in CWR, the total length was 0.75km or more. The term ‘CWR’ is
no longer used although you may still find it in old documents or painted signs.)

LWR is typically any length larger than twice the breathing length, which allowed at the end of the welded rail section which
is free to expand or contract as the temperature changes. (Beyond the breathing length, the rails do not move because of
the resistance of the fasteners and the sleepers and ballast.) The breathing length varies with the temperature range, the
sleepers, and the type of rails, but is typically 10m or less with concrete or steel sleepers. The expansion range of the rails is
reduced with the steels of higher tensile strength, such as the 90UTS and 110UTS steels, allowing longer welded sections to
be built.

With welded sections, the maintenance and safety problems of having rail joints with fishplates, etc., are reduced but welded
rail also calls for more precise provisioning of distressing/pretensioning to account for thermal expansion, etc. SWR with
three-rail welded panels results in 28-30 fishplated joints over the distance of a kilometer, which is the source of the
commonly heard (and beloved of railfans) clackety-clack rhythm of the wheels.

LWR is usually formed from panels of 10-rail or 20-rail length welded using flash but welding at specialized plants (Meerut,
Gonda, etc.). The welded rails are transported on special rail flat wagons which have end unloading chutes. LWR and CWR
are also formed by in situ welding of the rails using alumino-thermic welding (also known as thermite (thermit) welding). In
this, the highly exothermic reaction of aluminum with ferric oxide (provided as a plate called thermite) results in temperatures
of around 2500C and the reduction of the ferric oxide to elemental molten iron that then helps form a weld

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