Engineer L. N. Lyubimov

THE EIGHTEEN-POUND RAIL

AND

ITS SERVICE

on the Siberian Railway.

Tomsk.

Steam Typo-Lithography of P. I. Makushin, Blagoveshchensky Lane, own house.

1903.

Printed by resolution of the Council of the Tomsk Technological Institute
of Emperor Nicholas II.

Contents

	Page
Introduction	1
I. Insufficiency of the resistance of rails to horizontal forces	3
§ 1. Bending of the rail in the horizontal plane	—
§ 2. Pulling out of spikes	5
§ 3. Tilting of rails	9
II. Wear of rails	13
§ 4. Permissible limiting stress in rails	—
§ 5. Calculation of stresses in new and worn rails of the type 18 pounds per running foot under static and dynamic loads	14
§ 6. Proposal of the Commission, Most Highly approved, of Engineer Mikhailovsky concerning permissible stresses for the 18-pound rail	23
§ 7. Actual service of the 18-pound rail on the Siberian Railway	24
§ 8. Interaction of worn rails and tires	32
III. Rail breakage	36
§ 9. Rail breakage on the Siberian Railway	—
§ 10. General conclusions	43
IV. Mass continuous replacement of light rails by heavy ones	44
§ 11. General considerations regarding the proposals on this question of the Commission of Engineer Mikhailovsky	—
§ 12. Measures on the part of the Railway Administration to temporarily impart greater stability to the track	46
§ 13. Organization and execution of the mass continuous replacement of rails in 1901 and 1902	47
V. Service of heavy rails on the Siberian Railway	55
§ 14. Unexpectedness of certain circumstances that became apparent immediately after the first period of service of the heavy rails	—
§ 15. Measures for eliminating the phenomena indicated in § 14	57
Conclusion	59
Appendices	61

Introduction

The undoubtedly important significance that falls to the share of the Siberian Railway in the matter of both internal and external communications; its importance in a strategic respect, owing to the political conditions that have developed in the Far East; the importance which it has already demonstrated during mobilization at the time of the last Chinese war—all this cannot but compel one to treat with special attention each of those questions with which there may be connected a series of measures directed toward the direct, or at least only indirect, improvement of the condition of this great route. The present study is one of such endeavors and constitutes a summary of almost three years of my observations of the conditions of service of the permanent way of the railway, in the present case concerning only one of the principal parts thereof—namely, the rails.

Before, however, proceeding to the said question, I consider it necessary to note, if only in passing, the limits of the railway’s activity for which the above-mentioned permanent way was designed, and, moreover, for the main and most difficult part of the line—the former Central Siberian Railway, now the Eastern section thereof.

“The carrying capacity of the Central Siberian Railway,” it is stated in § 1 of the Technical Conditions) for the construction of this railway, “must be calculated for the passage of three pairs* of through military trains per day, of which one pair is mixed, consisting of passenger and freight cars. Accordingly, this railway must be provided with proper

*) “Technical Conditions for the Construction of the Central Siberian Railway from the Ob to Irkutsk. § 1. Carrying and traffic capacity of the railway.”

with rolling stock and provided with means for their storage and repair... On the stretches between stations, sidings for tracks must be arranged with such calculation that, with the construction of these passing loops, the carrying capacity of the railway could be brought up to 7 pairs of through military trains.”

The magnitude of the construction capital and, at the same time, the low population of the region and the development of industry in it, the conjectural question whether, in the near future, there would already arise a need to increase the traffic of the railway to the above-mentioned limit—seven pairs of trains—all this compelled the adoption, for construction, of initial conditions as modest as possible. Thus, among other things, the design of the railway was based on achieving the lowest initial cost of construction by means of corresponding simplifications in the technical conditions, insofar as this could, of course, be permitted without detriment to strength.

For the above-mentioned reason, the track of the Siberian Main Line was built of a light type, with the assumption of a speed not exceeding 25 versts per hour, and under the condition that only six-wheeled locomotives would be used. On this basis light rails were laid, weighing 18 pounds per running foot; the thickness of the ballast layer was reduced to 0.12 sazhen (under the rail base), with a width at the top of 1.30 sazhen; and sleepers 1.15 sazhen long were permitted, instead of 1.25 sazhen.

The unexpectedly great growth of traffic (at present the development of the tracks for the passage of 16 pairs of trains is impending), which in turn caused the need to accelerate this traffic and to put into service stronger locomotives, very soon forced recognition of the complete inadequacy of continuing to leave on the railway the light 18-pound rails.

The principal circumstances that revealed all the unsuitability of these rails were: I. Insufficiency of their resistance to horizontal forces. II. Exceptionally severe wear and III. Bursting.

I.

Insufficiency of the Rails’ Resistance to Horizontal Forces.

The insufficiency of the resistance of the 18-pound rail to horizontal forces is expressed in three kinds of phenomena: 1) Bending of the rail in the horizontal plane. 2) Pulling out of spikes. 3) Twisting of the rail and wave-like shifting of the track.

§ 1. Bending of the rail in the horizontal plane. Turning to the study of the first of the phenomena indicated above—the bending of the rail in the horizontal plane—I permit myself to note that the continentality of the severe Siberian climate, where the temperature fluctuates within such wide limits as from −40 to +40° R., has an extremely severe effect on the superstructure of the track in general. In the present case, however, the influence of heat manifests itself in a rather exceptional form: it is observed that, when the temperature rises, the rails do not overcome the friction at tightly bolted fish-plates, but bend in the horizontal plane at various places along the link, forming curves with a noticeable, and sometimes even comparatively large, versed sine of deflection. Thus the clearance at the joint, despite its presence, loses all its significance. It is clear that the deflection may also reach such dimensions that the wheels of the rolling stock fall inward between the rails, or else the track itself, over a more or less considerable length, shifts somewhat to the side. Several such cases have been observed on the Siberian Railway, but one of them is especially characteristic; its conditions can give a fully clear idea both of the very picture of the phenomenon and of

grave consequences caused by them. The matter concerns the derailment of mail train No. 3, which was traveling on May 12, 1900, from Irkutsk to Chelyabinsk, at 1,765 versts from Chelyabinsk (between the Mariinsk and Bogotol stations). This train, consisting of one baggage car, one mail car, and seven first-class cars, with one eight-wheeled locomotive, suffered a wreck at the 1,765th verst under the following circumstances: while the train was proceeding on a 0.008 grade and a curve of radius 250 sazhen, at a speed of about 15 versts per hour, the engine driver, without reaching about 20 sazhen to the point of derailment, noticed a skewing of the guard rail inward in the form of an angle. Recognizing the inevitable danger, he nevertheless managed only to close the regulator. A minute after this the locomotive had already left the rails and, after passing over the sleepers for about 27 sazhen, buried itself to the left in the embankment. The engine driver, his assistant, and the stoker managed to jump off the locomotive and, in falling, received only minor bruises. Behind the locomotive there derailed: its tender (with the front wheelset and the rear left wheel), baggage car No. 563, which stood at an angle to the tender, and the following first-class car, which came off with its front wheelset to the left. Both the locomotive and the cars proved to be considerably crushed and with many broken parts. Upon further inspection it turned out that the track was damaged for a distance of fifty sazhen, and from the beginning to the end of the derailment site it was completely torn up by the locomotive, the sleepers were broken, and the rails overturned. In the first rail length (see the diagram on drawing sheet No. I), the left rail \(aa\) is overturned with its head to the left in the direction of motion, while the right rail \(a_1a_1\) lies normally; the initial joints \(ss\) of both rails remained in unbroken connection with the preceding rail lengths, on which the influence of the general deformation of the track was slight. In the second rail length the left rail \(bb\) is overturned with its head to the left in the direction of motion, while the right rail \(b_1b_1\) lies normally. Both joints \(ab\) and \(a_1b_1\) are torn apart; the joint \(bc\) likewise. The joint \(b_1c_1\) is intact. In the third rail length the rail \(cc\) lies on the shoulder of the roadbed, overturned to the left in the direction of motion. The rail \(c_1c_1\) is canted out to the left, but its joints with the neighboring rails are not torn apart. In the fourth rail length the rail \(dd\) lies overturned with its foot upward; the rails \(d_1d_1\) are bent; the joint \(cd\)

torn apart. In the fifth rail length, the left rail, at a distance of 1.60 sazhens from the joint (toward Irkutsk), burst. In this, part \(s_1\) remained fastened to the left rail of the preceding length, while part \(s_2\) was bent toward Chelyabinsk. The broken end \(i'\) was found wedged into the lower part of the boiler, while the end \(i_1\) was projecting from beneath the locomotive; at the same time its joint with the left rail of the following length was not torn apart, and this latter rail was bent into an arc (see phototype No. 1). The joint of the right track was torn apart, and the length itself was bent into an arc. In the sixth length both rails were bent into an arc to the right, looking in the direction of motion. The seventh length was shifted only somewhat to the right, but was not bent. In the subsequent lengths the track was entirely normal.

The investigation carried out showed that the sleepers at the point of derailment were laid in the same year, 1900; that the widening and elevation in the parts of the curve before and after the derailment were entirely normal; but that the ballast layer was only 0.12 sazhens. In view of this, the cause of the derailment should be considered to have been the above-mentioned distortion of the rails, which appeared as a consequence of the weakness of their profile and of the displacement of the track when they became distorted, owing to the not entirely normal quantity of ballast*).

The above-mentioned phenomenon of distortion sometimes occurs almost suddenly. Thus, for example, in the present case, only an hour and a half before the wreck, passenger train No. 3 passed over the same place quite successfully, as did mail train No. 4.

§ 2. Pulling up of the spikes. This phenomenon is undoubtedly closely dependent on the longitudinal bending of the rails, indicated in the preceding §, owing to the weakness of their profile, and is expressed in the unceasing pulling up of the spike shank near its head by the base of the rail when rolling stock passes. Some idea of this phenomenon may be obtained from the account of one of the locomotive engineers who had traveled with a freight train over one of the mountain sections of the Eastern division of the line. This engineer, who had just arrived

*) The latter circumstance could not be imputed to the administration of the railway, since the complete ballasting of the Eastern division of the Siberian Railway will be finished only in 1903.

at the station of his traction section, where at that time the train with which I was traveling was standing, immediately asked the local Chief of the traction section to hand over to me five spike heads, stating that, while proceeding very slowly up a 0.017 grade (there was a rather severe frost in perfectly calm weather), he heard quite distinctly a “clicking”: first once, then a second time, and after that three more times in succession. Thinking that some breakage had occurred in the locomotive, he stopped the train at the nearest siding, inspected the locomotive, and, finding no defects in it, concluded that perhaps a rail had burst under the train. Returning on foot along the entire train to the place where he had heard the clicking, he found and picked up, as it turned out, the five heads mentioned above, which had flown off from raised spikes. The appended photographic plate No. II is not an intentionally grouped assortment of such spikes, but a sample taken from a heap prepared to be sent as scrap to the yard of the section storehouse of one of the mountain sections.

Determining in nature the average amount of rise of the spikes in the above-mentioned plate gives, for an intermediate spike, from 3 mm to 5 mm (from 14 mm to 9 mm), and for a joint spike 5 mm (from 14 mm to 9 mm). It is clear that on the line there are also cases of greater rise, reaching, as was indicated above, the complete tearing off of the head. It is not difficult to see that, when a train passes, the rails, springing in the horizontal direction, after the passage again assume their normal position.

According to investigations by the well-known German scholar Weber, carried out by him on well-maintained roads, concerning the pressure experienced by rails on curves, it appears that at small radii the pressure on the outer rail reaches 8, and on the inner rail 7 mm. This pressure, and, as a consequence of it, the temporary widening of the track, are revealed instantly under the pressure of the flange of the tire, which tends to overturn the rail; the latter assumes, as has been said, its original position as soon as this momentary pressure ceases.

The greatest permissible gauge on curves on Russian railways fluctuates, as is known, within the pre—

No. I.

Wreck of Train No. 3 at verst 1765 on May 13, 1900.

No. II.

Bending of spikes.

within the limits from 1544.7 mm (0.724 sazh.) up to 1553 mm (0.728 sazh.), and the above figures also include the temporary widening that may result from the movement of trains. On the Siberian Railway this total widening, for radii from 120 to 150 sazh., has been set at 0.01 sazh. Thus the limiting gauge width on curves is expressed as 0.724 sazh. = 1544.7 mm ∞ 1545 mm. If one adds to this the temporary compression on the guard rail, let us say, of only 5 mm, and the play in the spike holes, we obtain \(1545 + 2 \times 5 = 1555\) mm—that is, a width that is unconditionally extremely dangerous, since with the said compression the flanges of the wheels on the outer rail—the flanges of the opposite wheels—will barely hold on the inner rail (more precisely, on the inner side face of its head). It goes without saying that the slightest jolt in the track is sufficient for a derailment to occur.

In the same way, derailment is almost inevitable also in the case when rolling stock follows a curve of small radius on such running gear which, by reason of one or another defect, excessively spreads the track, i.e., in other words, increases the aforementioned compression to limits even higher than those determined by Weber. Such a phenomenon was observed repeatedly on the Siberian Railway at low train speeds and with certain defects in the car bogies, owing to which they would turn into the curve only with difficulty, and a moment would come when one or another bogie (especially the rear one) assumed such a position that its wheels spread the inner rail—already weakened by the lifting of the spikes—and pushed it outward. Such, for example, were the circumstances of the derailment of mail train No. 4 on December 25, 1900. While this train was running on a curve of 250 sazh. radius at the 2386th verst from Chelyabinsk,* the following came off the rails: the 3rd car from the locomotive, a third-class car, with the right wheels of the rear bogie; the 4th mixed first–second-class car—with the left wheels of the front bogie and the right wheel of one axle of the rear bogie; the 5th second-class car—with the left wheels of the front bogie and the right wheel of one axle of the rear bogie; and the 6th, third-class car, with the left front wheel—

* Between Ilanskaya and Taishet stations.

by the underframe of the front truck. The train was stopped by the Westinghouse brake at a distance of 20 sazhen from the place of derailment; moreover, owing to the fact that the train was ascending a 0.016 grade at a speed of only about 15–17 versts per hour, the derailment took place not only without casualties among people, but almost without damage to the rolling stock. An inspection of the track after the incident showed, in general, its complete normal condition as to level and gauge, a sufficient thickness of ballast, and good quality of the sleepers. At the very place of derailment, the guard rail on the side of the direction of motion remained entirely undisturbed. One rail length of this same rail, from the beginning of the derailment on the side opposite to the direction of motion, had been displaced from its normal position by the thickness of a spike. One spike fastening the rail to the tie plate and sleeper on the outside of the guard rail had been cut off.—Four rail lengths of the inner rail had been canted outward by approximately 45° from the normal position. The spikes fastening this rail on the outside, although they remained in place, were strongly raised, and their heads had even been bent back. The spikes on the inside (two on each sleeper) had been pulled out of the sleepers by approximately one-third of their length. The investigation established that the derailment began with the rear truck of a third-class car, whose wheel flanges, pressing against the head of the inner rail, canted it outward, owing to the weak resistance of the raised spikes.—A detailed inspection of the truck of the above-mentioned car (the car body was lifted at the station nearest the place of derailment, in the turntable shed, and the trucks were rolled out) gave the following results: 1) the wear surface at the truck center pin, in the mutually contacting parts of the truck and the body, showed that the parts of this bearing had been out of action for a comparatively long time, since the surfaces of the lower shoulder of the bearing, both of the body and of the truck, proved to be covered with a layer of old rust, and in places with sticky dirt. In addition, on the kingpin bearing surface of the car body there were deep scratches and scoring in the direction of rotation of the contacting surfaces.

2) On one of the side bearing pads of the car truck, over which its body slid when turning, there proved to be a ble—

a shining, polished surface from constant contact, while on another, besides the aforementioned smoothly polished surface, a whole series of concentric grooves running along the bearing was observed. The third and fourth bearings: half were brilliantly polished, and half covered with rust. From this it is clear that the body of the car, with all its weight, rested quite unevenly on the bearings of both trucks, namely: on one truck on half the surface of the bearing, and on the other—on all their surface; the kingpin pivots, however, did not at all serve as points of support and took no part in transmitting the load.

The large number of derailments, due to the combined effect of the above-mentioned causes—the weakness of the track and certain defects in the running gear of the rolling stock—compelled the railway administration to direct its attention chiefly to strengthening the track, in the sense of placing additional tie plates on every sleeper in curves of radius up to 300 inclusive, with the driving of additional spikes. The lifting of spikes after this, it is true, somewhat decreased, but in general continued to reach very substantial figures:

Thus, for example, over two years, 1900 and 1901, on only 7 sections of the railway, due to the lifting of spikes, 288,500 spikes were replaced, including 244,500 intermediate spikes and 44,000 joint spikes!

§ 3. Canting of rails and wave-like shifting of the track. The weakness of the rail profile manifested itself with particular clarity in such cases as the destruction of the track at excessive train speeds.

It is known that the force of the lateral impacts of locomotives is incomparably greater than the resistance of the rail track, and if constant derailments do not occur, this is due only to the friction of the rails against the tires of the wheels striving to overturn them. The force of friction is, of course, proportional to the load on the wheel, and in cases where one or another wheel is unloaded as a result of irregular temporary displacements of the locomotive’s center of gravity, occurring during excessively rapid running, the force of the friction that preserves the track more or less disappears, and there remains only the destructive action of the lateral impacts from the temporarily lightly loaded wheels, against whose influence the re—

…of the resistance of the spikes, even when the latter are reinforced with tie-plates. Nevertheless, the degree of weight and stiffness of the rail section ought, in this respect, to render substantial assistance; meanwhile the 18-pound rail here, more than anywhere else, shows its complete inadequacy, since the picture of the track in almost every derailment for the above-mentioned reason was accompanied either by: a) canting over of the rails for a considerable distance, as though they had been fastened with ordinary nails and not with spikes, or b) a wave-like displacement of the track. In the first case, very often the rails lay completely flat, so that part of the rolling stock passed along the groove formed by the head and the foot of the rail.—In this respect, the derailment of train No. 33 at verst 2436 (between the Taishet and Nizhneudinsk stations) on April 6, 1901, is a very instructive case.

This train, consisting of two locomotives, one loaded and 42 empty cars, upon leaving a 0.015 grade for a level stretch, suffered a derailment at the end of a curve of radius 150 sazhens; first the second locomotive left the rails, then the first locomotive broke away from it, tore up the check rail and, having canted over the entire outer rail for a distance of 23 sazhens, passed with its right wheel along the groove between the head and the foot of the overturned rail throughout the indicated distance and then buried itself in the embankment, as shown in photograph No. III; in the process twenty-three empty cars were smashed to pieces, piled up over a distance of only 18 sazhens one upon another. Of the persons accompanying the train, by some special good fortune only two received injuries, and those only slight.—I note that the above-described overturning of the rail occurred despite the fact that, for greater stability of the track, the entire curve had been laid continuously with tie-plates on every sleeper, of which the tie-plates under the outer rail were fastened with four spikes, and those under the inner rail—with three.

Apart from cases of derailment accompanied by the phenomenon of rail canting—complete overturning of the inner rail on curves at low speeds has repeatedly been observed.

A characteristic example of a wave-like displacement of the track at a high speed of movement over a considerable length may…

No. III.

Wreck of Train No. 33 at verst 2436 on April 3, 1901.

could serve as the derailment of train No. 31 on September 5, 1901, at verst 2819 from Chelyabinsk, between the Zima and Irkutsk stations. The circumstances of the incident were as follows:

Train No. 31, which had departed from Tyret station, consisting of 17 loaded cars with tea, coal, stone, and lime, and 2 empty unbraked flatcars from the stone that had been unloaded on the preceding section and placed at the tail of the train, at 7 o’clock in the morning Petersburg time (local time about 12 h. 45 m. in the afternoon), suffered a derailment at verst 2819, on a 0.015 downgrade, in a sharp curve \(R = 150\) sazhens. The head conductor Lazuruk was killed, and 4 members of the train crew were injured. Compound locomotive No. 486 toppled inward on the curve onto the embankment slope (at this place 0.78 sazhens high) and dug its wheels into the ground; behind it, a damaged covered loaded car remained on the track, and then the rest: 14 loaded covered cars and 1 flatcar were completely smashed to pieces and piled up over a space of less than 40 sazhens; one unbraked covered loaded car and two empty flatcars proved to be only slightly damaged and remained on the rails.

Upon inspection of the condition of the track by a commission that arrived 1 hour after the derailment, it was found that the track had been laid with light 18-pound rails on three-hole tie plates on each sleeper, laid in 1901, fastened on the outer rail with 4 spikes and on the inner with 3 spikes (on both sides of the convexity of the curve—with two), with a ballast thickness under the rail base of 0.15 sazhen and a width of 1.35 sazhens. On the sections surviving beneath the last cars, the track proved to have been shifted in a wave-like manner, with the greatest track displacement corresponding to the greatest widening of the gauge; namely, in the three waves of this displacement, consecutively from the tail to the head of the train, the gauge widths were: 0.726, 0.729, and 0.739 sazhen. Conversely, at the remaining points of the track left in place, the gauge width was equal to the value required by a radius of 150 sazhens—0.724 sazhen. The amounts of displacement were, in the same order: 0.010, 0.010, 0.012 sazhen.

The circumstances accompanying the derailment were the following: during the preceding day rain had fallen almost continuously, especially intensifying toward the time of the derailment. In view of the continuous extreme

on the descent from the Shetika siding to Zima station, the train, despite the efforts of the engine driver and the conductor’s crew, as established by the investigation, did not moderate its speed and developed a speed of more than 40 versts per hour; moreover, on a curve of \(R = 150\) sazhens it produced a shifting and widening of the track, caused, in addition to the inappropriate speed of travel, also by the abrupt action of counter-steam: the counter-steam produced a lateral rolling of the locomotive, which completely deranged, with ever-increasing oscillations, the superstructure, weak by its construction; as a result, the locomotive, tearing up the track, toppled down the slope, cutting into the ground, and upon it the cars piled up, derailing and running into one another, owing to the considerable speed.

The commission of inquiry recognized as the causes of the accident: 1) an undoubted shock, dependent both on the possible subsidence, in rainy weather, of one of the rails, and on the incorrect, as was revealed in this case, setting-out of the curve, which in part was joined from an arc smaller than the limiting one permitted by the technical specifications for a gradient of 0.015 with a radius of 150 sazhens, as shown on the as-built construction profile.

2) The insufficiency of the train’s braking capacity, resulting both from the discrepancy between the standard number of braked axles established by the traffic regulations for the grades of the descent from Shetika to Zima (0.015–0.017 according to the profile), and from the improper placement of brakes in the train that suffered the wreck, as well as from damp weather and wet rails.

3) The considerable running speed of the loaded train, almost of the limiting consist, which developed as a consequence of the foregoing and which the engine driver could not reduce, although for that purpose he made use of the only level stretch in the profile, at verst 2824, where he also applied counter-steam.

II.

Wear of Rails

§ 4. Permissible limiting stress in rails. The wear of rails on the mountain and some foothill sections of the Siberian Railway is so powerful a factor in clarifying their complete incompatibility with the conditions of safe operation that, as will not be difficult to see from what follows, it compels one to pay special attention to it—chiefly in view of the fact that it indicates with due clarity one of those aspects of the construction of our rail track that requires the establishment of somewhat more definite standards: I am speaking of the limiting stress permissible in worn rails. As early as 1898, at a meeting of the Engineering Council on November 28, a report was heard by Professor L. F. Nikolai, “On the question of those guiding principles that should be adhered to in designing the proposed new types of rails, and on the question of the limiting coefficients of stresses permissible in worn rails”; in it the esteemed speaker stated, among other things, that although “the stress in a rail depends not only on the cross-section of the rail and the mutual spacing between sleepers, but also on the dimensions of the sleepers, the quality of the ballast, its height, etc., nevertheless, in view of the circumstance that in a worn rail the material has already been subjected several times to overstress and the permissible stress must rather be reduced, it is necessary to establish a standard solely for this: to what limit it is permissible to allow an increase of stress in the rail as a consequence of the reduction of its height by wear, without requiring a corresponding change in the remaining elements

of the superstructure.” According to the journal of the Engineering Council of March 23 and June 3, 1898, No. 163, it was established: in determining the mutual spacing between sleepers, for given sleeper dimensions and for the thickness and quality of the ballast, the stress in the new rails, calculated by Zimmermann’s formula at a speed of motion \(V=0\), must not exceed \(R=14.5\) kilograms per square millimeter.

Professor Nikolai considers it possible, as the rails wear, not to require changes in the arrangement of the sleepers, their dimensions, or the thickness and quality of the ballast, if the stress in the rail increases by no more than 20%; with a coefficient of 2.35, corresponding to considerable speeds, overload in motion, etc., this will amount, for the temporary resistance, to

\[ 14.5 \times 1.2 \times 2.35 = 40.89 \frac{\text{kg}}{\text{mm}^{2}} \]

For rail steel with a temporary tensile resistance of about 65 kilograms, the elastic limit will amount to about 0.6 of the temporary resistance, i.e., 39 kilograms, which is only slightly less than the above-mentioned limit.

§ 5. Calculation of stresses in new and worn rails of the 18-pounds-per-running-foot type under static and dynamic loads. Zimmermann’s formula, by which the calculation of stresses in rails under a static load is usually carried out, has, as is known, the form:

\[ M^{\max.}=\frac{8\gamma+7}{8(2\gamma+5)}Pl \ldots \ldots \ldots \ldots \ldots (A) \]

Here: \(M^{\max.}\)—the greatest bending moment

\(P\)—the greatest pressure on a locomotive wheel, in tons

\(l\)—the distance between the axes of the sleepers, in centimeters

\[ \gamma=\frac{B}{D} \]

—the ratio of the force (in kilograms) capable of causing, in a piece of rail of length \(2l\) lying freely on two supports (sleepers), a deflection of 1 centimeter, to the force \(D\) (in kilograms) that lowers by 1 centimeter a support consisting of a sleeper of half-length.

\[ B=\frac{6EI}{l^3}, \]
where \(I\) is the moment of inertia of the rail, and \(E\) is the modulus of elasticity of steel.

\[ D=\frac{abC}{2}, \]
where \(a\) is the length of the sleeper, \(b\) its width, and \(C\) the coefficient of elasticity of the ballast, i.e. the pressure (in kilograms per square centimeter of ballast) under the action of which the latter undergoes an elastic settlement of 1 centimeter.

The quantities indicated above, for the Siberian Railway, depending on its conditions in the first period after being opened for operation, had the following values:

\(P_1=6.25\) tons for three-axle freight locomotives with an axle load of \(12 \tfrac{1}{2}\) tons.

\(P_2=6.50\) tons for four-axle “Compound” freight locomotives with an axle load of \(12.84 \approx 13\) tons.

\(l\)—with 12 sleepers—\(0.35^{\mathrm{s}}=74.7\) centimeters.

\[ E=2200000\ \frac{\mathrm{kg}}{\mathrm{cm}^2}. \]

\[ I=468.6\ \mathrm{cm}^4. \]

\[ a=1.15^{\mathrm{s}}=245.4\ \mathrm{cm}. \]

\[ b=4\tfrac{1}{2}\ \text{vershoks}=20\ \mathrm{cm}. \]

\[ C=3\ \text{kilograms}. \]

Substituting these quantities into the corresponding expressions, we find:

\[ B=\frac{6EI}{l^3} =\frac{6\times 2{,}200{,}000\times 468.6}{74.7^3} =14839.3 \]

\[ D=\frac{abC}{2} =\frac{245.4\times 20\times 3}{2} =7362 \]

\[ \gamma=\frac{B}{D} =\frac{14839.3}{7362} =2.016 \]

Hence:

\[ P_1l=6.25\times 1000\times 74.7=466875 \]

\[ P_2l=6.50\times 1000\times 74.7=485550 \]

Further:

\[ \frac{8\gamma+7}{16\gamma+40} = \frac{8\times 2{,}016+7}{16\times 2{,}016+40} = \frac{23{,}128}{72{,}256} = 0{,}320 \]

\[ \mathrm{M}_{1}^{\max.}=0.320\times 466875=149400 \]

\[ \mathrm{M}_{2}^{\max.}=0.320\times 485550=155376. \]

Under such conditions, \(W\)—the section modulus of the worn rail—equals \(87\ \mathrm{cm}^{3}\).

The stress of the rail under a static load will be expressed respectively as:

\[ \mathrm{R}_{1}=\frac{\mathrm{M}_{1}}{\mathrm{W}} = \frac{149400}{87} = 1717\ \frac{\mathrm{kg}}{\mathrm{cm}^{2}} \quad \text{or} \quad 17{,}17\ \frac{\mathrm{kg}}{\mathrm{mm}^{2}} \]

\[ \mathrm{R}_{2}=\frac{\mathrm{M}_{2}}{\mathrm{W}} = \frac{155376}{87} = 1786\ \frac{\mathrm{kg}}{\mathrm{cm}^{2}} \quad \text{or} \quad 17{,}86\ \frac{\mathrm{kg}}{\mathrm{mm}^{2}} \]

Taking the best present conditions of the track in respect to ballast and sleepers, than in the first years of operation of the railway, i.e. the length of the sleeper as \(1.25\) sazhen with a maximum width of \(6\frac{1}{2}\)–\(7\) vershoks and the number of sleepers as 13 pieces per rail length, i.e.

\[ C=5, \]

\[ a=1.25^{\mathrm{s}}=266{,}6\ \mathrm{cm}. \]

\[ b=6\frac{1}{2}\ \text{vershoks}=30\ \mathrm{cm}. \]

\[ l=0.324^{\mathrm{s}}=69{,}1\ \mathrm{cm}. \]

We find:

\[ \mathrm{B}=\frac{6EI}{l^{3}} = \frac{6\times 2200000\times 468{,}6}{69{,}1^{3}} = 18748.8 \]

\[ \mathrm{D}=\frac{abC}{2} = \frac{266{,}6\times 30\times 5}{2} = 19995 \]

\[ \gamma=\frac{\mathrm{B}}{\mathrm{D}}=0.937 \]

At the same time, however, the types of locomotives running on the railway also changed, namely: “Duplex” freight locomotives were added, with an axle load of \(13.6\) tons and

passenger locomotives with an axle load of 13.85 tons. Therefore, in the following calculation, retaining the previous notation, we obtain:

\[ \begin{aligned} P_1 l &= 6.25 \times 1000 \times 69.1 = 431875,\\ P_2 l &= 6.50 \times 1000 \times 69.1 = 449150,\\ P_3 l &= 6.80 \times 1000 \times 69.1 = 469880,\\ P_4 l &= 6.93 \times 1000 \times 99.1 = 478863. \end{aligned} \]

Determination of the ratio \(\dfrac{8\gamma + 7}{16\gamma + 40}\) gives:

\[ \frac{8\gamma + 7}{16\gamma + 40} = \frac{8 \times 0.937 + 7}{16 \times 0.937 + 40} = \frac{14.496}{54.992} = 0.264. \]

Hence:

\[ \begin{aligned} M_1^{\max} &= 0.264 \times 431875 = 114015,\\ M_2^{\max} &= 0.264 \times 449150 = 118575,\\ M_3^{\max} &= 0.264 \times 469880 = 124048,\\ M_4^{\max} &= 0.264 \times 478863 = 126419. \end{aligned} \]

Under the condition of rail wear of 2 mm and 5 mm, the corresponding section moduli will be \(W = 83\) and \(W = 80\). Hence:

For wear of 2 mm.	For wear of 5 mm.
\(\displaystyle R_1=\frac{M_1}{W}=\frac{114015}{83 \times 100}=13.73\ \frac{\mathrm{kg}}{\mathrm{mm}^2}\)	\(\displaystyle R_1=\frac{114015}{80 \times 100}=14.25\ \frac{\mathrm{kg}}{\mathrm{mm}^2}\)
\(\displaystyle R_2=\frac{M_2}{W}=\frac{118575}{83 \times 100}=14.29\ \text{»}\)	\(\displaystyle R_2=\frac{118275}{80 \times 100}=14.78\ \text{»}\)
\(\displaystyle R_3=\frac{M_3}{W}=\frac{124048}{83 \times 100}=14.94\ \text{»}\)	\(\displaystyle R_3=\frac{124048}{80 \times 100}=15.51\ \text{»}\)
\(\displaystyle R_4=\frac{M_4}{W}=\frac{126419}{83 \times 100}=15.231\ \text{»}\)	\(\displaystyle R_4=\frac{126419}{80 \times 100}=15.80\ \text{»}\)

Proceeding to determine the stress in the rails under dynamic loading at various speeds, we shall use

for this by the formula established by the latest “Technical Conditions for the Construction of Main Lines,” where the static pressure \(P\) is replaced by the pressure:

\[ P'=\frac{P}{1-\frac{8\gamma+7}{16\gamma+40}\times\frac{Plv^{2}}{EIg}}\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ .\ (Б) \]

Here \(P\)—load on a wheel, in kilograms.
\(I\)—moment of inertia of the rail, in centimeters.
\(C\)—ballast coefficient, in kilograms.
\(l\)—distance between the axes of the sleepers, in centimeters.
\(v\)—speed, in centimeters per second.
\(g\)—acceleration due to gravity, in centimeters per second.
\(E\)—modulus of elasticity of steel.

Case 1. The initial conditions of the track, in which it was placed in service: the greatest speed of motion is 25 versts per hour—741 \(\frac{\text{cm}}{\text{second}}\)*); \(C=3\); \(E=2{,}200{,}000\); \(I=468.6\); 12 sleepers under a rail length, i.e. \(l=74.7\) cm; the greatest pressure on a wheel \(P=6500\) kg. Under such conditions, as we saw earlier:

\[ \gamma=2.016;\quad \frac{8\gamma+7}{16\gamma+40}=0.320; \]

Formula (Б) takes the form:

\[ P'=\frac{6500}{1-0.320\times\frac{6500\times74.7\times741^{2}}{2200000\times468.6\times981}}=7098{,}844 \]

*) 1 verst \(=1.06679\) kilometers.

\[ P^{1}=7098{,}844 \times 74{,}7 = 530283{,}6468 \]

\[ M^{\max.}=P^{1} \times 0{,}320 = 169690{,}7669 \]

\[ R=\frac{M^{\max.}}{W}=\frac{M^{\max.}}{8700}=19{,}504 \]
kilograms per 1 square millimeter.

Case 2. Present condition of the track: \(C=5\); 13 sleepers under a rail length, i.e. \(l=69{,}1\) cent.; \(P=6930\); \(\gamma=0{,}937\); \(\frac{8\gamma+7}{16\gamma+40}=0{,}264\).

\(V=25\) versts per hour \(=741\ \frac{\mathrm{cm}}{\mathrm{sec.}}\). The rail is new.

\[ P^{1}= \frac{6930}{ 1-0{,}264 \times \frac{6930 \times 69{,}1 \times 741^{2}} {2200000 \times 468{,}6 \times 981} } =7440{,}7 \]

\[ P^{1}=7440{,}7 \times 69{,}1 = 514152{,}37 \]

\[ M^{\max.}=514152{,}37 \times 0{,}264 = 135736{,}225 \]

\[ R=\frac{M^{\max.}}{W}=\frac{M^{\max.}}{8700}=15{,}60 \]

Case 3. Present condition of the track: \(C=5\); 13 sleepers under a rail length,

i.e. \(l=69{,}1\) cent.; \(P=6930\); \(\gamma=0{,}937\); \(\frac{8\gamma+7}{16\gamma+40}=0{,}264\).

\(V=35\) versts per hour \(=1037\ \frac{\mathrm{cm}}{\mathrm{sec.}}\); rail wear 2 mm. \(W=83\). Rail wear 5 mm; \(W=80\).

Under such conditions formula (B) takes the form:

\[ P^{1}= \frac{6930}{ 1-0{,}264 \times \frac{6930 \times 69{,}1 \times 1037^{2}} {2200000 \times 468{,}6 \times 981} } \]

and

determined by virtue of the new conditions:

\[ R_1=\frac{M^{\max.}}{W}=\frac{P^{11}\times 0,264}{8300}=17,597 \]

\[ R_2=\frac{M^{\max.}}{8000}=18,26 \]

Case 4. The same conditions of the track, axle pressure, and rail wear as for Case 3, but the speed is \(50\) versts per hour \(=1482\ \frac{\mathrm{cm}}{\mathrm{sec.}}\). Then:

\[ P^1=\frac{6930}{1-0,264\times \dfrac{6930\times 69,1\times 1482^2}{2200000\times 468,6\times 981}} \]

\[ R_1=\frac{M^{\max.}}{W}=\frac{M^{\max.}}{8300}=20,99 \]
kilograms per 1 sq. millimeter.

Case 5. The same conditions of the track, axle pressure, and speed of motion as for Case 4, but the rail wear is \(5\) mm, and the section modulus \(W=80\):

On the basis of the preceding considerations:

\[ R_1=\frac{M^{\max.}}{W}=21,78 \]
kilograms per 1 sq. millimeter.

A comparison of the stresses from dynamic loads with the stresses under static loads, obtained by calculation according to the two above-indicated formulas (A) and (B), gives the following:

For a new rail under the initial conditions of the track and of locomotive operation.

At \(V=0\) versts; \(R=17,86\) kilograms per 1 sq. millimeter.
» \(V=25\) » \(R=19,50\) » » » » »

For a new rail, with the present condition of the track and locomotives, at \(V = 25\); \(R = 15.60\).

For a rail worn by 2 mm, with the present condition of the track and locomotives.

At \(V = 0\) versts; \(R = 15.231\) kilograms per 1 square millimeter.
At \(V = 35\) » \(R = 17.597\) » » » » »
At \(V = 50\) » \(R = 20.99\) » » » » »

For a rail worn by 5 mm, with the present condition of the track and locomotives.

At \(V = 0\) versts; \(R = 15.80\) kilograms per 1 square millimeter.
At \(V = 35\) » \(R = 18.256\) » » » » »
At \(V = 50\) » \(R = 21.78\) » » » » »

In fact, during the movement of rolling stock, there occur, as is known, sometimes much more significant differences between the results of the action of the static and dynamic pressure of the wheels on the rails. The principal factors in this circumstance are:

1) The action of the counterweights of the locomotives.
2) The play of the springs.
3) Uneven wear of the tires, and sometimes flats on them.
4) Unevenness in the dimensions of the cross-section of adjacent rails, in the sense of unequal wear both in the horizontal and in the vertical planes.
5) Curvature of new rails along the axis, owing to their being straightened not immediately upon leaving the rolls, but by a press in the cold state, which causes the rolling stock to sway along the track and produces unequal tension of the fibers at different points of one and the same rail.
6) Heterogeneity of the structure of the material in the rail, as a result of which different places of one and the same rail may exhibit unequal resistance.
7) The existence in the rail of a certain internal stress of the fibers, as a result of rolling.

8) The oscillation of the bent rail itself in the track about its position of equilibrium, owing to the sudden application of the load—the wheel.

9) The influence of braking.

10) Defects of the track in the sense of: poor tamping of the sleepers, poor alignment, irregularity of superelevation, improper condition as to template and level, uneven spacing of sleepers, etc.

11) Wind pressure on the rolling stock.

Any sufficiently exact dependence of this increase on the aggregate of the above-mentioned factors has, unfortunately, not yet been investigated to such an extent as to be expressed by any definite formulas; but in any case some certain data have been obtained which prove a considerable excess of the stresses due to dynamic load over the values calculated for such stresses. Thus:

As to item 1. According to Ast’s investigations, fluctuations in the pressure of locomotive wheels during motion reach up to $\pm 0.50$ of the static wheel pressure*).

As to item 2. According to the observations of Michel and Brière, play in the springs sometimes causes a change in the axle loads up to $\pm 0.63$ of the static wheel pressure*).

As to item 5. According to the statement of engineer A. von Dormus, on the Northern Austrian Emperor Ferdinand Railway even such small deviations as 2 mm had an extremely detrimental effect on the rails of that railway**).

As to item 6. This is sufficiently confirmed by investigations of rails according to the method of engineer Barba***).

As to item 8. According to the considerations of engineer Boguslavsky†), the increase of stress from this cause varies from 0 to 100% depending on the speed.

*) See Der Eisenbahnbau der Gegenwart. Blum, Brrsei und Barkhausen, p. 135.

**) “Nouvelles études sur l’acier pour les rails.” Bulletin de la Commission Internationale du Congrès des chemins de fer, 1899, p. 977.

***) ibid., p. 937.

†) “On the question of strengthening the permanent way.” Journal of the Ministry of Ways of Communication, 1899, I.

Regarding item 10. The unsatisfactory tamping of sleepers increases, according to the calculations of Engineer Kholodetsky, the stress in the rail at times by as much as 5%.

According to the testimony ) of the American engineer Dudley, he observed stress in rails reaching as much as 83 kilograms per 1 sq. millimeter, despite the brilliant* condition of the track!!

Moreover, Engineer Vasyutynsky’s experiment on the Warsaw–Vienna Railway established that Zimmerman’s formula itself, when applied to rails of a light type, gives an error in the direction of a reduction of stress: thus, for rails of the 22½-pound type, the stresses determined by direct observations proved to be 17% greater than those calculated by Zimmerman’s formula. For rails of the 18-pound-per-linear-foot type this difference, in all probability, is considerably greater and in some cases exceeds the elastic limit, reaching the temporary resistance; this is confirmed, as will be seen below, by the enormous number of rails of this type that break.

It may be said with certainty that, if with rails of a weak section trains still run safely, then this, for the most part, depends either on the unconditionally well-maintained track and the conditions of its profile, or on some other, exclusively local circumstances: as, for example, the highest speeds of movement sometimes coincide with the favorable condition that the train is proceeding precisely downhill, and therefore without the work of the locomotive counter-steam, which throws the track out of order and overstresses the rails. An equally certain guarantee of less overstressing of the track with light rails is, of course, provided by those sections of railways where the traffic is mainly almost exclusively passenger traffic, i.e. train movements, although fast, but comparatively light and uniform in the composition of the rolling stock.

§ 6. Proposals of the Engineer Mikhailovsky’s Commission, approved by Imperial authority, concerning the stresses permissible for the 18-pound rail—

) See Compte rendu général du Congrès international des chemins de fer*. 1901. Vol. I, p. 176.

In its calculations*) the Commission of Engineer Mikhailovsky assumes that the stress in the rails under a dynamic load may be allowed up to the elastic limit, which is equal to 0.6 of the temporary resistance, and, considering that from the action of the dynamic load, from the vertical component of the centrifugal force caused by the rotation of locomotive counterweights, from impacts at irregularities of the tire and other causes “the actual stresses exceed by \(4/9\) the magnitude of the stresses determined under a static load,” it accepts that the ultimate resistance may be allowed to be

\[ \text{not more than } \frac{4}{9} \times 0.60 = 0.267 \]

of the temporary resistance under a static load, or, in round numbers, 0.25. Further, since for rails ordered before 1894 the steel withstood, in tensile tests, from 54 to 60 kilograms per 1 sq. millimeter, while for rails ordered from 1894 onward the temporary tensile resistance of the steel was taken as 65 kilograms per 1 mm.\(^2\), the Commission establishes two stress limits under a static load:

For rails ordered before 1894—\(54 \times 0.25 = 14.5\), in round numbers 14 kilograms per 1 sq. millimeter.

For rails ordered from 1894 onward—\(65 \times 0.25 = \mathbf{16.25}\) kilograms per 1 sq. millimeter.

Under a dynamic load:

For rails ordered before 1894—\(54 \times 0.6 = \mathbf{32.4}\) kilograms per 1 sq. millimeter.

For rails ordered from 1894 onward—\(65 \times 0.6 = \mathbf{39}\) kilograms per 1 sq. millimeter.

The last of these figures is identical, consequently, with that permitted by Professor Nikolai.

§ 7. The actual service of the 18-pound rail on the Siberian Railway. Turning to the results of the actual service of the light rail on the Siberian Railway, I consider it necessary first to make the following reservations:

*) Report of the Commission, approved by the Highest Authority, for determining on site the measures necessary to strengthen the carrying and traffic capacity of the Siberian Railway and to increase the speed of movement on it of trains, p. 139.

a) The dynamic stresses in the rail under the present conditions of its service were calculated by me on the assumption \(C = 5\), that is, with ballast of such quality as in fact is found only, by way of exception, over comparatively very short lengths. It will be much more in accord with the truth to take the actual value of \(C\) as equal to 4, and on the Western section of the line, in many, many places, as 3.5: the sand here is extremely fine, is easily blown out by the wind, and is lifted by the movement of trains *). This is why the stresses calculated by formulas (A) and (B) correspond only to those, so to speak, “ideal” places on the track where the condition \(C = 5\) obtains. In all other places they are, of course, much higher, independently of all other circumstances (listed in § 5) that affect the increase in stresses from the dynamic load.

b) The modulus of elasticity of steel \(E\)—introduced by me into formula (B)—should, under the old conditions for the supply of rails, be taken as equal to 2,200,000. Under the new ones it is somewhat lower: 2,000,000.

In considering the service of the rail on the Siberian Railway, one must above all make a strict distinction with respect to the sections where it lies, namely:

a) On the Western part of the line—which represents almost throughout one level section with limiting grades not exceeding 0.0074 and curves not sharper than 200 sazhens.

b)—On the foothill sections of the former Central Siberian Railway, with a profile characterized by grades up to 0.008 and curves not sharper than 200.

c)—On the mountain sections of the former Central Siberian Railway, whose profile is very difficult, namely grades up to 0.0174 and curves from 120 sazhens.

I. Western section of the line.—As early as the Commission of Engineer Mikhailovsky, during its inspection of this line in the summer of 1898, it was established that the wear of rails laid in 1893, after five years of service, proved to be equal to 1.5 millimeters; while those laid in 1894—1 millimeter on tangents and 2 mm—

*) As a consequence of this, at the present time it has begun to be covered with crushed stone.

in curves of radius 200. In addition, crushing at the joints has been observed. At the present time the wear on the straight portions of this section reaches 3–3½ mm.

It was determined above that, for a rail worn by 2 mm and for an improved condition of the track, the stress under a static load is equal to 15.231 kilograms per 1 sq. millimeter, whereas the allowable stress for rails ordered before 1894 is only 14.

At the speeds of movement now in effect, 35–50 versts per hour, the stresses were calculated at 17.597 and 20.99 kilograms per 1 square millimeter. It is not difficult to see, therefore, that with wear of 3–3½ mm and speeds up to 50 versts per hour, the stresses in these rails—given the presence of the other collateral causes enumerated in § 5—undoubtedly reach, and sometimes exceed, the elastic limit, which, among other things, is confirmed, as stated above, by the mass breaking of rails. Thus it is clear that: a) the improvement of the stability of the track proposed by the commission of Engineer Mikhailovsky and now almost completely carried out—1) increasing the number of sleepers under each rail to 13, instead of the 12 laid, and increasing the length of the sleepers from 1.15 sazh. to 1.25 sazh.; 2) laying three-hole tie-plates on each sleeper with the driving of three spikes; 3) raising the ballast layer to the normal height—has proved to be only a temporary measure, which does not improve the situation radically; and that: b) the condition of the rails compels one to conclude that their average service life is far below the 12-year period assumed by the commission*).

II. The level portion of the Eastern section. Here the state of affairs was incomparably worse. Already the same commission, during an inspection in 1898, i.e. one year after the road had been put into operation, determined the wear to be 1 mm. At the present time this wear reaches astonishing dimensions.

In the table set forth below are indicated several such cases of wear, relating to rails laid in 1894 and 1895 and which therefore had served in the track for 7 and 6 years respectively**).

*) P. 140 of the report.
**) Observations were made in 1901.

Table of the amounts of wear and loss of weight of 18-pound rails
on the level part of the Eastern section of the Siberian Railway.

No. in order	Profile: straight or curve	Profile: level or gradient	Rail length	Rail mark	Greatest wear, mm	Normal weight of rail A, poods	Normal weight of rail A, lb	Weight of worn rail B, poods	Weight of worn rail B, lb	Amount of loss in weight \(S = A - B\), lb	Loss of weight, %	Loss of weight per 1 running foot, lb
1	straight	level	\(28'\)	Demid. 1895	\(3\frac{1}{2}\)	12	24	12	17	7	1.4	0.25
2	straight	level	\(28'\)	O.P.Z. 1895	2	12	24	12	12	12	2.4	0.43
3	straight	\(i = 0.008\)	\(28'\)	O.P.Z. 1894	\(2\frac{1}{2}\)	12	24	12	\(\frac{1}{2}\)	\(23\frac{1}{2}\)	4.7	0.84
4	straight	\(i = 0.007\)	\(28'\)	Demid. 1895	\(2\frac{1}{2}\)	12	24	12	18	6	1.2	0.21
5	\(R = 150\)	level	\(28' \frac{1}{8}''\)	O.P.Z. 1894	\(3\frac{1}{2}\)	12	24	12	10	14	2.7	0.50
6	\(R = 150\)	level	\(28'\)	O.P.Z. 1894	6	12	24	12	8	16	3.2	0.57
7	\(R = 150\)	\(i = 0.008\)	\(28' \frac{1}{2}''\)	Demid. 1894	6	12	24	12	\(\frac{1}{2}\)	\(23\frac{1}{2}\)	4.7	0.84
8	\(R = 150\)	\(i = 0.008\)	\(28' \frac{1}{4}''\)	O.P.Z. 1894	4	12	24	12	3	21	4.2	0.75
9	\(R = 250\)	level	\(28' \frac{1}{4}''\)	Demid. 1895	\(3\frac{1}{2}\)	12	24	12	6	18	3.5	0.64
10	\(R = 250\)	level	\(28' \frac{1}{4}''\)	Demid. 1894	4	12	24	12	\(19\frac{1}{2}\)	\(4\frac{1}{2}\)	0.9	0.16
11	\(R = 250\)	\(i = 0.006\)	\(28' \frac{1}{4}''\)	Demid. 1895	3	12	24	12	2	22	4.3	0.78
12	\(R = 250\)	\(i = 0.009\)	\(28' \frac{1}{4}''\)	Demid. 1894	4	12	24	12	6	18	3.5	0.64
13	\(R = 300\)	level	\(28'\)	Demid. 1894	\(4\frac{1}{4}\)	12	24	12	2	22	4.3	0.78
14	\(R = 300\)	level	\(28'\)	O.P.Z. 1894	\(4\frac{1}{2}\)	12	24	12	1	23	4.6	0.82
15	\(R = 300\)	\(i = 0.006\)	\(28' \frac{1}{4}''\)	Demid. 1894	\(2\frac{3}{4}\)	12	24	12	\(\frac{1}{2}\)	\(23\frac{1}{2}\)	4.7	0.84
16	\(R = 300\)	\(i = 0.008\)	\(28' \frac{1}{8}''\)	Demid. 1894	4	12	24	12	\(\frac{1}{2}\)	\(23\frac{1}{2}\)	4.7	0.84
17	\(R = 300\)	\(i = 0.008\)	\(28'\)	Demid. 1895	\(1\frac{1}{2}\)	12	24	12	8	16	3.2	0.57

Note. The rail profiles taken from the site and pertaining to the present table are appended at the end of the present study.

The gross*) load, in tons, that passed over the said rails:

\[ \left. \begin{array}{rcl} \text{In }1895\text{ year} \\ \text{» }1896\text{ »} \\ \text{» }1897\text{ »} \\ \text{» }1898\text{ »} \end{array} \right\} = 432{,}000\ \text{tons.} \]

\[ \begin{array}{rcl} \text{» }1899\text{ »} &=& 1{,}224{,}000\ \text{»} \\ \text{» }1900\text{ »} &=& 1{,}344{,}600\ \text{»} \\ \text{» }1901\text{ »} &=& 1{,}893{,}600\ \text{»} \end{array} \]

\[ \text{Total} = 4{,}894{,}200\ \text{tons, or, in round numbers, }5{,}000{,}000\ \text{tons.} \]

Comparing this figure with the data of the table given above, we find that the wear in the height of the head:

a) In the straight parts of the track of the said section varies within the limits from \(2^{1}/_{2}\) to \(3^{1}/_{2}\) mm. (See sheets Nos. II and III, profiles Nos. 3 and 1), giving an average wear of 3 mm, or

\[ \frac{3}{5} = 0.6 \]

mm for each 1,000,000 tons of gross freight movement.

b) In the curved parts of the track the same wear varies within the limits from 2.75 mm (see sheet IX, profile No. 15) to \(4^{1}/_{2}\) mm (see sheet VIII, profile No. 14), giving an average wear of 3.63 mm, or

\[ \frac{3.63}{5} = \]

\[ = 0.72 \]

mm for each 1,000,000 tons of gross freight movement.

c) The magnitude of lateral wear varies from \(3^{1}/_{2}\) mm (see sheet VI, profile No. 9) to 6 mm (see sheets IV and V, profiles Nos. 6 and 7) and, on average, amounts to:

\[ \frac{4.75}{5} = \]

\[ = 0.95 \]

mm for each 1,000,000 tons of gross freight movement.

According to the data of Organ für die Fortschritte des Eisenbahnwesens), the average normal wear in the height of the rail head for each 1,000,000 tons reaches, on roads with plain

*) Gross load \(G = 3 \times 2 \times 360 [16n + 100]\), where \(n\) is the number of cars \(= 25\), and 100 tons is the weight of the locomotive and tender.

**) 1886, p. 223.

character (with gentle gradients—less than \( \frac{1}{180} \)—and curves of large radii)—from 0.05 to 0.1 mm.

For level sections with somewhat steeper gradients \(\left(\frac{1}{150}\text{ to }\frac{1}{120}\right)\) and curves of large radii, the same average normal wear is from 0.14 to 0.17 mm for each 1,000,000 tons.

For sections of line with gradients from \( \frac{1}{100} \) to \( \frac{1}{60} \) and curves of radius from 500 to 200 meters, such wear is taken as 0.25 mm.

Thus the vertical wear of rails on the level sections of the Eastern part of the Siberian Railway exceeds the above-mentioned maximum standards (0.25 mm and 0.1 mm) by from three (0.72 mm) to six (0.6 mm) times.

Lateral wear in comparatively gentle curves \((R=300)\) reaches, as may be seen (see Sheet IX, profile No. 16), 4 mm, with a total loss of weight of \(23\frac{1}{2}\) pounds, or 0.84 pound per running foot of rail length.

Considering further some of the profiles, for example profiles Nos. 1, 12, 13, 14, and 16, one cannot fail to discern complete deformation in comparison with the initial condition, expressed partly in flattening alone (Nos. 12, 13, and 16), or else in flattening together with a spalling of part of the head by a longitudinal crack (Nos. 1 and 14).

It is therefore not difficult to understand the wholly weak resistance of such rails. A curious example of the latter may be the case that occurred in May 1902 at Bogotol station: under a locomotive standing on a transition curve from the main track to the traction tracks, a rail burst into seven pieces. The fragmentation of the rail occurred quite suddenly, without the participation of any other mechanical agent except the pressure of the locomotive’s own mass.

III. Mountainous part of the Eastern section of the line. With rails laid in 1895–1896, the following average wear had to be observed on the 18th section of the Track Service of the line.

Order No.	Track profile: straight or curve	Track profile: level or grade	Rail length, ft	Mark	Wear, mm
18	\(R=150\)	\(i=0.0174\)	28	А.Ю.Р.З.Б.О.95.II.	4
19	\(R=150\)	\(i=0.0174\)	—	—	\(3\frac{1}{2}\)
20	\(R=150\)	level	—	1896.VI.Н.З.Б.Г.О.	4
21	\(R=150\)	level	—	—	4
22	straight	\(i=0.016\)	—	—	3
23	straight	\(i=0.016\)	—	—	\(3\frac{1}{2}\)
24	\(R=300\)	\(i=0.015\)	—	—	3
25	\(R=300\)	level	—	—	\(3\frac{1}{4}\)
26	\(R=150\)	level	—	—	\(3\frac{1}{4}\)

Note. The rail profiles for Nos. 18–26 are appended at the end of the present investigation.

Gross freight in tons that passed over the given section:

In 1897
» 1898
\(\left.\begin{array}{l} \\ \end{array}\right\}\) = 216,000 tons.

» 1899 » = 1,296,000 »

» 1900 » = 1,350,000 »

» 1901 » = 2,075,000 »

Total = 4,937,000 tons, or, in round numbers, 5,000,000 tons.

Thus the average wear:

a) On the straight portions of the mountainous section of the track it ranges between 3 and \(3\frac{1}{2}\) mm and therefore gives an average figure:

\[ \frac{3.25}{5} = \]

\[ = 0.65 \text{ mm for each } 1{,}000{,}000 \text{ tons of gross freight movement.} \]

b) In the curved parts, the average wear per each 1,000,000 tons is expressed by the figure:

\[ \frac{3+4}{2\times 4}=0.7\ \text{mm}. \]

In general, almost the same figure as for the wear of curves on the level part of the railway (0.72 mm).

According to the data of the same “Organ für die Fortschritte des Eisenbahnwesens”) the average normal wear for mountain* sections per each 1,000,000, for gradients of 0.017 and curves of radius about 100 sazhen, is 0.50 mm, and reaches 1 mm only for gradients of about 0.025 and curves of radius about 100 sazhen.

Thus the average vertical wear of the straight parts of mountain sections is certainly higher than the usual standards, and the wear in curves is in general also extremely high. As for lateral wear in curves of small radii (150 sazhen), I personally had occasion to see on the 19th section of the Track Service two rails whose lateral wear had reached 8 mm. According to the statement of the local section chief, he had at different times removed several rails with lateral wear of up to 11 and even 12 mm. These rails lay on a bypass track; probably the bypass curve had been laid out either not quite correctly or with too sharp a radius. In general, such exceptionally great, or else uneven, wear of one and the same rail length in its different places is always an indication of some substantial defect in the layout of the given curve. Thus, for example, above (p. 11) there was mentioned the case of the derailment of train No. 31 at 2,819 versts from Chelyabinsk. The investigation indicated an entirely improper layout of the curve, with varying degrees of wear of the rails composing it. In fact it turned out that this curve, which according to the construction profile was listed as having a radius of 150 sazhen, in reality consisted (see Plate XV) of an aggregate of small arcs of seven different radii, for the most part less than 150 sazhen, alternating moreover in a completely inconsistent manner:

Thus after a radius of 176 came a radius of 114, after this the following radius was 154, then 149, then 130, 122, and finally 156.

*) 1886. P. 223.

To blame the builders for so major a defect especially strictly is impossible, if one recalls, on the one hand, the haste with which the work proceeded, where it was required at all costs to link the various sections as quickly as possible into one common main line, and, on the other hand, takes into account also the exceptionally difficult conditions under which it was necessary to work on the construction of the Siberian Railway and especially of its Eastern forest section, with the impassable wilds of the taiga and swamps, malaria, and an overwhelming abundance of every kind of “gnat,” i.e., midges, mosquitoes, and horseflies.

There is no doubt, however, that there is more than one such irregularity as the one cited above; but all of them can be found only by the most thorough checking of the entire profile of the 3000-verst railway—a task, of course, rather costly, but nonetheless absolutely necessary.

§ 8. Interaction of worn rails and tires.

The wear of the rails in both tracks of curves in most cases proves to be entirely different in its character: thus, in the outer track the inner lateral face is cut away, while in the inner track it is the top, and moreover on the inner face of the latter there very often remains a certain edge, serving, among other things, as a quite clear indication of the circumstance that, when the train is in motion, the flanges of the tires of the locomotive and cars almost do not touch the inner face of the inner track.

When rolling stock passes from a straight line onto a curve, the deviation of the locomotive from rectilinear direction begins from the moment when the flange of the first wheel (which is to move along the outer track) begins to press on the inner lateral face of the outer rail, and the locomotive, striving at every subsequent instant of passage along the curve to move along the tangent to it, is, owing to the resistance of the outer rail (which guides the motion), displaced sideways in the direction of the axis, turning about the inner wheel of its rear axle as the center of rotation. When the edge of the tire of the front wheel runs onto the above-mentioned lateral face of the outer rail, friction develops, assisting the flange

No. IV.

Wear of rails on curves. Amount of wear: \(6\ \mathrm{m/m}\).
In addition, bending of the web.

No. V.

Wear of rails on curves. Amount of lateral wear: \(8\ \mathrm{m/m}\).

climb onto the rail; and for the locomotive itself to turn and for the wheels to slide along the rails, it is necessary that the leading wheel exert pressure on the guard rail, depending on the load on the leading axle and sufficient to overcome this friction. The pressure of the leading axle is then transmitted, by means of the frame, to the other axles of the locomotive. From this it follows, of course, that the friction between the rail and the flanges of the locomotive tires has extremely great importance when the locomotive passes through a curve. Thus the interaction of rail and wheels, to a substantial degree, determines the degree of safety of motion in the very matter itself: with a certain limiting wear of the tire, when it forms something like a sharp wedge, this artificial knife, with each passage through a curve, more and more scrapes away the side face of the guard rail; and ultimately, when such wear has reached a sufficient degree, it climbs along the inclined plane of the latter onto the rail head, and from there outward from the track—and a derailment occurs. The above-described phenomenon of such dangerous interaction between the tire and the worn rail, in all its unsightly clarity, is unfortunately also manifested on the Siberian Railway.

The tables of wear on p. 27 and p. 30, the profiles of worn rails Nos. 6, 7, and 10 on Plates IV, V, and VI, and phototypes Nos. IV and V give a sufficient idea of the degree and character of this phenomenon. Considering in particular phototype No. V (a longitudinal view of the rail), it is not difficult to observe that the entire inclined face of wear is furrowed by a parallel series of serrations from the sharp flanges of tires attempting to climb along the inclined face onto the rail head. Phototype No. IV shows not only a fairly strong wear of the side face, but also a certain bending of the rail web as a result of the excessively weak profile of the very type of light-weight rail.

In phototype No. VI the very appearance of the flange from the worn tire of a locomotive is striking. It is a perfect likeness of a sharp cutter. Direct measurement of this flange gives 17 mm.*).

*) Nizhneudinsk traction section.

In phototype No. VII, on the tire flange there is clearly imprinted a series of parallel notches, which are the consequence of the above-mentioned climbing of the flange onto the guard rail.

In the drawings Nos. 27 and 28, appended at the end of the article on sheet XVI, are shown the true profiles taken from the tires of two locomotives of one of the Eastern traction sections*). On both flanges, 17 mm thick, the outlines of a normal flange are indicated by dotted lines.

Such, in general terms, is the character of the limiting wear of the tires of very many locomotives running on the mountainous section of the Siberian Railway. From the traction service there are constant complaints about the necessity of renewing the turning of the tires long before the time due under normal service conditions.

Meanwhile, to do anything in this direction in the present state of affairs is almost impossible: the total length of curves with a steep radius of 120–150 reaches on the line the considerable figure of 658**) versts, and their improvement would be possible in the majority of cases only by a radical breaking-up of the entire line, with its being laid along new alignments, which in part have already been determined and in part can only be determined in the future.

Something in the sense of improving the profile is being done at the present time as well: in rebuilding wooden bridges as iron ones and as culverts, and likewise in constructing new sidings—chiefly with respect to redesigning the roadbed with flatter curves (and also gradients); but all this is still only a drop in the sea.

A certain means of reducing the wear of tires and rails on such sharp curves might perhaps be the practice, used on some foreign railways where curves of especially small radii exist, of lubricating the tire flanges, by means of a special device, with oils or petroleum residues. According to testi—

) Ilansky traction section.
*) Western section 97.65 versts and Eastern 533.73; Tomsk branch—26.68 versts.

No. VI.

Wear of wheel tires; flange with a 17 mm point.

No. VIII.

Wear of wheel tires; flange with a 17 mm point.

According to the German engineer Bödecker*) the service life of a tire is thereby increased by 40–50%, and rail wear is significantly reduced. According to experiments on the Bavarian railways, the resistance to the motion of rolling stock on curves with radii from 300 to 550 meters is reduced by 49% by lubrication; on curves with radii from 150 to 200 meters—by 54%; and on one curve with a radius of 100 m—by as much as 61%.

The above-mentioned method of lubrication has been introduced, among others, on the following Austrian and German railways: “Oesterreichische-Nordwestbahn,” “Oesterreichische Südbahn,” “Kaiserin Elisabeth-Bahn,” “Oesterreichische Staats-Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft,” “Bayerische Staatsbahn,” and “Oberhessische Bahn.” On the Berlin urban railway (Berliner Stadtbahn), locomotives are equipped with a device for spraying water on the wheel tires on sharp curves.

It would also be useful to carry out an experiment with lubricating the tires with oils on the Siberian Railway, although, perhaps, conditions of exceptional extremes in temperature may also have an adverse effect: namely, in the sense of impairing the necessary adhesion of the wheels to the rails (at least on considerable gradients). Apparently the second measure would be more expedient—i.e. spraying the tires with warm water. Such a method, at least, is also practiced on our railways in the form of spraying the rails themselves, instead of sprinkling sand, in order to prevent the slipping of wheels.

*) “Die Wirkungen zwischen Rad und Schiene” Nach eigener Theorie von Boedecker. Hannover. 1887.

III.

Rail Breakage

§ 9. Rail breakage on the Siberian Railway.

The breakage of light rails is, on the Siberian Railway, so painful a matter that it deserves somewhat more detailed examination. Not to mention that the very number of rails that break—as may readily be seen from the table below—is extremely considerable, the nature of the fracture itself is, chiefly, very often especially dangerous for traffic and has more than once already been the cause of wrecks with very serious consequences.

The point is that on other railways, in the majority of cases, a rail that has broken has only one fracture; on the Siberian Railway, however, a breaking rail very often falls apart into several pieces, sometimes before the passage of the train, sometimes under the locomotive itself, while the latter is in motion, and sometimes even while standing, under the action of merely the static load (see the case already indicated on p. 29). Thus, where on other railways it is at times possible to let a train pass quite freely over a broken rail, sometimes even (if the fracture is at a sleeper) without special precautions and delays to the train, in Siberia this is for the most part altogether impossible, and a rail that has broken and remained unnoticed, or a rail that breaks under the train itself, not infrequently serves as the cause of serious derailments.

The number of pieces into which rails break varies greatly and ranges from a simple fracture into two parts to fractures into 13 and 23 parts.

The places of fracture are the most varied: at the holes, outside the holes—(at the web); splitting off of part of the head, splitting off of the entire head from the web, partial splitting off of the base, splitting off of the entire base

from the neck; simultaneous: breaking off of the head, cracking of the neck into several—mostly triangular—pieces, and breaking off of the base, etc.

The number of such fractures is also very varied, but for the most part the cracking occurs outside the holes: thus, for example, in 1901 alone there cracked: at the holes—only 41 rails; outside the holes—2641 pieces.

Places according to the track profile for the same year 1901: there cracked on a level section and on tangent track 654 pieces; on a level section and on a curve—380; on grades and on tangent track—514, and on grades and on curves—1134 pieces.

Statement of cracked light-type rails for 1901.

Name of works	At the holes	Outside the holes	Total	Of these: on level section, on tangent track	Of these: on level section, on curve	Of these: on grade, on tangent track	Of these: on grade, on curve
Demidov	—	1	1	1	—	—	—
—	—	3	3	1	1	—	1
—	—	1	1	1	—	—	—
—	4	62	66	27	2	16	21
—	12	232	244	99	32	24	89
—	13	773	786	103	141	119	423
—	8	570	578	73	97	106	302
—	1	127	128	32	15	38	43
—	—	2	2	—	1	—	1
—	—	5	5	3	—	2	—
—	—	8	8	5	1	1	1
Nadezhda	—	7	7	1	—	2	4
—	1	139	140	19	23	38	60
—	—	161	161	38	16	31	76

Name of works	According to diagrams	Outside diagrams	Total	Of these: on level section—on straight	Of these: on level section—on curve	Of these: on grade—on straight	Of these: on grade—on curve
—	—	5	5	—	1	2	2
—	—	1	1	1	—	—	—
—	—	1	1	—	1	—	—
A.Yu.R.Z.V.O.	—	18	18	4	1	8	5
—	1	92	93	69	5	17	2
—	—	68	68	16	11	19	22
—	—	2	2	1	1	—	—
Beloselsky	—	1	1	1	—	—	—
—	—	82	82	27	5	28	22
—	—	73	73	44	7	15	7
—	—	38	38	22	3	7	6
—	—	2	2	1	1	—	—
—	—	1	1	—	1	—	—
O.P.Z.	—	51	51	30	3	14	4
—	—	45	45	5	1	18	21
—	—	2	2	1	1	—	—
—	—	2	2	2	—	—	—
N.R.O.	—	8	8	2	3	—	3
—	—	9	9	2	2	—	5
—	—	16	16	3	2	2	9
—	—	1	1	1	—	—	—
Yu.R.D.M.O.	1	32	33	19	2	7	5
Total	41	2641	2682	654	380	514	1134

Looking at the above table of rails that broke in 1901, it is not difficult to see that, by the brands of the works, the largest percentage falls on the rails of the Demidov Works, and the smallest on the rails of the Novorossiisk Company.

By years of service, the breaking of rails is presented in the following form:

1897.	1897.	1898.	1898.	1899.	1899.	1900.	1900.	1901.	1901.	Total.	Total.	Total.
On straight track.	On curves.	On straight track.	On curves.	On straight track.	On curves.	On straight track.	On curves.	On straight track.	On curves.	On straight track.	On curves.	Total.
165	142	501	389	677	781	1097	1236	1168	1514	4705	4062	8677

Thus, in five years there broke

\[ \frac{8677}{250}=35 \]

versts of rails, or seven versts of rails per year.

The cause of so enormous a quantity of breaking rails should be sought in three circumstances:

1) Heavy wear and, as a result of it, weak resistance to dynamic forces.
2) The poor quality of the material itself.
3) The exceptional conditions of the Siberian climate.

1. The weakness of resistance resulting from the profile and, in particular, from wear was examined by me in §§ 5 and 7 of the present study and, I believe, sufficiently explained.

2. The poor quality of the material itself is expressed not in an abundance of blowholes and similar defects, but chiefly in the excessive softness of the steel, owing to which shaving of the rails occurs on curves, reducing the resistance of the profile to the limit of elasticity. Especially conspicuous in this respect are the rails of the Demidov Works.

3. The severity of the Siberian climate is manifested chiefly in the fact that the rail is placed under such conditions that the overstressing of the metal reaches extreme limits: that

the climate that is ascribed to Siberia in the geography of former years, i.e. continental, characterized by the greatest extremes of temperature in summer and winter, exists to this day: the heat within the limits of the Siberian Railway reaches in summer, as was said above, \(+40^\circ\) R., falling in winter to \(-40^\circ\) R., and sometimes much lower*); but, on the other hand, one of the conditions of a continental climate—constancy of temperature over a certain more or less prolonged period of time—apparently does not in fact exist: in winter there are considerable fluctuations in temperature. The temperature graph for October and November 1902, appended at the end of the present study as Sheet XVII, may give some idea of the extremely uneven course of the latter.

In drawing up the design of the Siberian Railway, as far as may be recalled, account was taken, among other things, of the data under which the construction of the roads of the far north of the North American States was conditioned. It must be supposed that the conditions of rail service on those roads were also considered; but one thing, apparently, was not taken into account: 1) in general, the mean temperature is much lower in Siberia than in America. 2) The duration of the cold is far from the same.

Thus, in his report made at the international railway congress, Inspector of American railways, Eng. Dudley, says**) that the minimum temperature in the eastern part of the North American States falls to \((-34^\circ .4\ \text{C.})\), whereas in Siberia it reaches, as indicated above, \(-52^\circ\) R. = \(-65^\circ\) C. In addition, from the diagrams of temperatures for the winter months, included in the same report, it is evident that true winter begins in North America only from the very last days of November, or rather from the beginning of December, and continues until the beginning of March—whereas in Siberia winter very often begins from the first days of October and continues until the last days of March, hence at least \(2 \tfrac{1}{2}\) months longer.

In any case it is quite obvious that a rail, strained under such conditions by two principal agents: temperature

*) Thus, in 1902 there were days with \(t^\circ = -43\) R., and in 1896 with \(t^\circ = -52^\circ\).

**) Congrès International des chemins de fer. Compte rendu général I. V. p. 51.

No. VIII.

Train wreck No. 36 at verst 2422.

stress proper from the rapid disruption of the internal structure of the metal molecules under the influence of abrupt transitions from one \(t^\circ\) to another, and by the tensile force stretching the rail as it contracts from a lowering of temperature, owing to the fact that the bolts hold it in the joint. The latter is not difficult to verify by examining the bolt holes, many of which bear traces of a certain stretching, as do also the skewed shanks of the bolts themselves.

The extreme danger which the fracture of every rail presents for the Siberian Railway compelled, from the very first days of the line’s entry into service, an increase in the premium for finding a broken rail to three rubles, instead of the 1 ruble—1 ruble 50 kopecks paid on other railways of the Russian Empire. Unfortunately, despite this, cases of wrecks due to breaking rails are fairly frequent, since circumstances occur in which even a practiced eye cannot catch the incipient crack or, rather, “junction,” which entails the subsequent sudden fracture of the rail under a train. Such an example may be the wreck of train No. 36 at the 2422nd verst of the line, near the wooden 10-sazhen bridge at that verst, where there was even a special bridge watchman. The circumstances of this derailment, a picture of which may be seen in phototype No. VIII, are as follows:

On April 10, 1901, at about 10:10 a.m. St. Petersburg time, train No. 36, at the end of a fifteen-thousandth grade, on leaving a curve of radius 150 sazhen for a straight, suffered a wreck at the bridge located at the same verst, with a clear span of 19.50 sazhen. The locomotive and sixteen loaded covered cars left the rails; of these, fifteen were smashed, while the sixteenth was only slightly damaged. The track was torn up for a length of eighty-one sazhen. In the wreck, by lucky chance, only the conductor and the oiler received minor bruises. The place of derailment: an embankment 2.25 sazhen high. Sleepers laid in 1900. Thickness of the ballast layer, 0.20 sazhen. Rails, of the 18-pound-per-running-foot type, fastened along the whole curve with four spikes to each sleeper. The cause of the wreck proved to be a rail broken into three

...a piece of rail under the locomotive at the very bridge, and all the fracture surfaces proved to be perfectly fresh; only on the very base of the rail was a microscopic old crack visible.

A case similar to the one just described is the derailment and wreck, on October 14, 1902, of train No. 26 at verst 2294, on a curve of 150 sazhen radius, where the cause of the wreck—fortunately not accompanied by human casualties—proved to be a rail that had burst into 6 pieces, with entirely fresh fractures, except for a hairline longitudinal delamination 188 mm long at the junction of the web with the base. It must be noted that in both of the cases described, the crack had decidedly no physical possibility whatever.

Be that as it may, the abundance of wrecks from the above-mentioned cause, a list of which I consider it not uninteresting to present in the following statement, involuntarily compels one to reflect on this extremely undesirable phenomenon.

Time of occurrence	No. of train and place of derailment	CONSEQUENCES OF THE DERAILMENT. Property destroyed	CONSEQUENCES OF THE DERAILMENT. Persons injured: killed	CONSEQUENCES OF THE DERAILMENT. Persons injured: wounded
1899. April 19.	Wreck of train No. 3 at 133 versts from Yenisei Station.	Track damaged to the amount of 500 rubles; rolling stock, 21,500 rubles.	—	12
August 22.	Derailment of train No. 1 at 2372 versts from Chelyabinsk.	—	—	—
21 „	Derailment of train No. 201 at 2064 versts from Chelyabinsk.	Cars and track to the amount of 20,800 rubles.	—	8
July 26.	Derailment of train No. 4 at 337 versts from Krasnoyarsk.	Rolling stock and track to the amount of 18,900 rubles.	—	6
1900. January 18.	Derailment of a locomotive in train No. 202 at 2101 versts.	9 rails broken.	—	—
February 20.	Derailment of a locomotive in train No. 25 at 2148 versts.	Locomotive damaged by 320 rubles; track by 100 rubles.	—	—
20 „	Derailment of a locomotive in train No. 447 at 2149 versts.	—	—	—
May 13.	Derailment of train No. 3 at 1765 versts.	Rolling stock to the amount of 8,097 rubles. Track to the amount of 407 rubles.	—	2

Time of incident	Train No. and place of derailment	Consequences of derailment: property destroyed	Killed	Injured
17 “	Wreck of ballast train No. 451 at verst 2948.	Rolling stock for 6,662 rubles. Track, 20 sazhens . . . . .	1	2
4 December.	Derailment of train No. 11 at verst 2146.	300 bolts and 400 spikes broken.	—	—
1901. 19 January.	Derailment of train No. 35 at verst 2147.	—	—	—
4 February.	Derailment of train No. 11 at verst 2478 “	4 rails . . . . . . . .	—	—
10 April.	Derailment of train No. 36 at verst 2422 “	Rolling stock for 13,588 rubles. Track for 867 rubles.	—	2
3 “	Derailment of train No. 33 at verst 2436 “	Rolling stock for 24,000 rubles.	—	2
1902. 18 October.	Derailment of train No. 26 at verst 2294 “	Rolling stock for 18,000 rubles.	1	—

§ 10. General Conclusions.

In concluding the question of the service of the light rail on the Siberian Railway, I consider it appropriate to repeat briefly those principal conclusions to which the foregoing investigation of the said question leads.

I. The stress in the 18-pound rail under static loading from the locomotives running over it is higher than the permissible value.

II. The stress in the same rail under dynamic loading is extremely high, and at times unquestionably exceeds the elastic limit.

III. Light rails are dangerous for localities with considerable summer heat, owing to the profile’s insufficient stiffness for resisting horizontal forces.

IV. Light rails are wholly unsuitable for roads with a mountainous character of profile, both because of the considerable degree of wear and because of the low resistance to lateral forces in the horizontal plane, in consequence of which the spikes work loose and the track dangerously widens.

V. Light rails are extremely unreliable in localities with severe frosts because of their low resistance to fracture.

IV.

Mass Continuous Replacement of Lightweight Rails with Heavy Rails

§ 11. General Considerations on This Question by Engineer Mikhailovsky’s Commission.

Already in 1898, the commission of engineer Mikhailovsky drew serious attention to the substantial unreliability of the 18-pound rail and, in its report, indicates, among other things, that “a comparison of the magnitudes of the permissible stresses with the magnitudes calculated by the commission shows that the actual stresses exceed the permissible ultimate resistance of the metal; moreover, the rail offers weak resistance to lateral forces. Taking into account the difficult profile of the Central Siberian and Transbaikal railways, with considerable gradients up to 0.0174 and curves described by radii of 150 sazhens and 120 sazhens, as well as the severity of the climatic conditions and the annually increasing number of rails that break, it must be recognized that 18-pound rails are not suitable for service when trains are permitted to run at speeds greater than 35 versts per hour. On this basis, it appears necessary on the specified railways, when speeds greater than 35 versts per hour are permitted, to replace the 18-pound rails with heavier rails, weighing 24 pounds per running foot, adopted for the connecting branch of the Siberian Railway with the Eastern Chinese Railway”*).

The same report further states:** “The conditions of the longitudinal profile of the West Siberian Railway, with gradients not exceeding 0.0074, the insignificant number of curves (7.5%), described—

) See p. 139 of the report.
*) Pp. 139 and 140 of the report.

curves with a radius of not less than 200 sazhen, permit the eighteen-pound rails to remain in service until the limiting wear is reached, increasing the strength and stability of the track by the following measures:

1) By replacing, on curves of radius less than 300 sazhen, the eighteen-pound rails with rails of the 24-pounds-per-running-foot type.

2) By bringing the number of sleepers under each rail up to 13, instead of the 12 laid, and by increasing the length of the sleepers from 1.15 sazhen to 1.25 sazhen.

3) By laying three-hole tie-plates on each sleeper and driving in 3 spikes.

4) By bringing the thickness of the ballast layer up to 0.22 sazhen, with its width at the top 1.45 sazhen.

Under such conditions it will be possible to permit on the West Siberian Railway the movement of trains at a maximum speed of up to 50 versts per hour and to leave the eighteen-pound rails until normal wear. The commission further expresses the conclusion that the average service life of the rails may be considered not more than 12 years. And, in addition to all the above: “On the West Siberian Railway there is a very insignificant number of ballast quarries; the sand contained in them is extremely fine; the ballast lying in the track is easily blown out by the wind and is raised by the movement of trains, which has a harmful effect on the service of the rolling stock and the rails. Therefore it appears necessary to cover the ballast in the track with crushed stone 0.04 sazhen thick, for which 40 cubic sazhen of crushed stone per verst will be required; this measure will, moreover, impart greater stability to the track”... “As regards the station, reserve, and main tracks within station limits and the existing passing sidings, then, since trains pass by at reduced speed, on the indicated tracks the eighteen-pound rails may be left under the existing conditions of track laying and ballast-layer thickness”...

It will be appropriate to mention that the stress calculations in the rails under dynamic load, given in Table No. 2 on page 138 of the same report, are lower than those obtained by me, namely: under the condition of 12 sleepers, \(C = 3\), their length 1.15 sazhen, and a full ballast layer, and with a locomotive wheel pressure of 7000 kilograms and new rails:

According to the Commission’s report.

At a speed of 25 versts per hour and a wheel pressure of 7000 kilograms,

\[ R = 11.6 \text{ kilograms.} \]

According to my calculation.

At a speed of 25 versts per hour and a wheel pressure of 6500 kilograms,

\[ R = 19.50 \text{ kilograms.} \]

With an improved condition of the track: 13 sleepers, 1.25 sazhens long, a full layer of ballast, and \(C = 5\).

According to the Commission’s report.

Speed 25 versts per hour. Pressure on the wheel 7000 kilograms. New rail.

\[ R = 10.8 \text{ kilograms.} \]

Speed 35 versts. Pressure on the wheel 7000 kilograms. Wear of the rails 2 mm.

\[ R = 12.3 \text{ kilograms.} \]

Speed 35 versts. Pressure on the wheel 7000 kilograms. Wear 5 mm.

\[ R = 12.8 \text{ kilograms.} \]

Speed 50 versts. Pressure on the wheel 7000 kilograms. Wear 2 mm.

\[ R = 13.5 \text{ kilograms.} \]

Speed 50 versts. Pressure on the wheel 7000 kilograms. Wear 5 mm.

\[ R = 14 \text{ kilograms.} \]

According to my calculations.

Speed 25 versts per hour. Pressure on the wheel 6930 kilograms. New rail.

\[ R = 15.60 \]

Speed 35 versts. Pressure on the wheel 6930 kilograms. Wear of the rails 2 mm.

\[ R = 17.596. \]

Speed 35 versts. Pressure on the wheel 6930 kilograms. Wear 5 mm.

\[ R = 18.257. \]

Speed 50 versts. Pressure on the wheel 6930 kilograms. Wear 2 mm.

\[ R = 20.99. \]

Speed 50 versts. Pressure on the wheel 6930 kilograms. Wear 5 mm.

\[ R = 21.78. \]

Be that as it may, leaving the 18-pound rails on the western section of the railway, even with an improved condition of the track, i.e. with the implementation of all the measures envisaged by the commission, and likewise leaving them on the main and passenger tracks of the sidings of the eastern section of the railway, where fast trains pass through the sidings very often without stopping at a speed which may at times reach as much as 30 versts per hour, can hardly be permitted without some danger.

§ 12. Measures on the part of the railway administration to temporarily impart greater stability to the track.

For greater safety of traffic until the completion of all the measures indicated by the com—

by the commission, the railway administration was at the same time to undertake a whole series of measures to give greater stability to the track with light rails, independently of the western section, and also on the eastern section of the railway, without waiting for their replacement by a heavier type of rail; namely, for example, three-hole tie plates with additional spikes were installed, as was already indicated above (§ 2), not only on such curves as curves of radius 120 and 150, but also on flatter radii up to radius 300 inclusive. The total number of such tie plates reaches the very impressive figure of one million two hundred sixty-eight thousand pieces. Then, in every possible way, both the securing of credits and the actual continuous replacement of light rails by heavy ones were urgently accelerated, and at the present time the entire part of the western section of the railway proposed by Engineer Mikhailovsky’s commission has already been laid, as well as the entire mountainous section of the railway (with the exception of the Tomsk branch)—in all, 1,072 versts.

At the same time, in

Year	Laid on the section	Length
1899	Western section	60 versts
1899	Eastern section	51 versts
1900	Western section	5.5 versts
1900	Eastern section	61 versts

§ 13. Organization and execution of the mass continuous replacement of rails in 1901 and 1902.

The increasing number of derailments, depending on the evident weakness of the rail profile and its abnormal wear, prompted the Railway Administration to accelerate, at all costs, the continuous replacement of rails, and it was decided, beginning in 1901, to carry this out on an intensified scale. The organization and the actual execution of the above-mentioned work were entrusted to me. In view of the certain interest that may be represented by this experience—quite exceptional in the annals of railway practice—of such a mass continuous replacement of rails, complicated moreover by certain local circumstances, I shall permit myself to present some data on the two-year replacement of rails during 1901 and 1902.

a) Number of rails replaced. In 1901, 455½ versts were replaced. In 1902—438½ versts—altogether, over the two years, 894 versts.

b) Marks and lengths of the rails. Almost all rails of the 24-pound type were obtained either from the Demidov or from the Bogoslovsk works, with a standard length of 28 and, chiefly, 35 feet.

c) Time of commencement of replacement and of its completion. In view of the exceptionally short Siberian summer and the possibility of beginning replacement only after some repair of the track, which had been badly distorted by the winter frosts and abounded in heaves (over 68,000 linear sazhen of heaves), it was necessary, on the one hand, to take the above circumstances into account, and, on the other, to await the receipt of rails, the greater part of which arrived by barge at the pier of Ob Station and, consequently, only after the opening of navigation and the passage by water of the long distance to the destination pier; this gave an extremely late date of arrival even at this terminal pier. Thus, for example, in 1902 the first consignment of Bogoslovsk rails arrived at the Ob pier only on June 24, and the last consignment at the end of August. Thus, even after the receipt of the rails, they still had to be distributed to the places of laying, which were at a very great distance from the Ob pier: thus, for example, the section nearest the pier (XVII, near Krasnoyarsk), on which laying was to be carried out, was at a distance of 830 versts, and the farthest (XXV, near Irkutsk) at a distance of 1708 versts! If one adds to this that, in all, about 1,500,000 poods of rails had urgently to be transported from the Ob pier, for which it was necessary to gather in one place almost the entire stock of flatcars of the railway, and moreover at the very hottest time of their use for other needs, for example for the removal of ballast, then it is easy to see under what difficult conditions the very beginning of the work found itself long before the work itself was undertaken. Thus, in general, the beginning of the replacement of rails in full scope could in any case be reckoned no earlier than the very last days of June. The end—depending on the receipt of rails—was sometimes prolonged until the end of October or even the first days of November.

d) The organization of the work itself also presented considerable difficulties, one of the principal ones being the almost complete absence of any personnel experienced not only in the replacement of rails, but in track work of any kind in general. This circumstance is not at all surprising if one takes into account the dreadful turnover among employees that is observed from year to year on the Siberian Railway: tables of dismissals, compiled by the head of the pension fund of the Siberian Railway, Mr. Sentyanin*), show that the overwhelming majority of persons leaving service on the Siberian Railway leave of their own accord, owing to unfavorable conditions of service, climatic hardships, the remoteness and lack of culture of the region, the high cost of living, and complete insecurity**). Thus, for example, in 1898, 3,293 persons resigned; in 1899—4,257; in 1900—3,809, and so on. It is clear that under such conditions there is no possibility of creating any experienced body of men. They have to be brought in from Russia. But, with very few exceptions, it is naturally possible to obtain only such employees as, for various reasons, cannot hold on in Russia. To entrust responsible work to such agents is extremely risky—but, willy-nilly, one has to put up with this as well.

With the aim of organizing the work of replacement at least somewhat satisfactorily, over the course of two years 26 experienced and more or less reliable track foremen were brought in from various railways, men personally known to me or to one of the agents of the railway from previous joint service in Russia, and moreover on terms considerably higher than the salaries in European Russia. Experience shows that these, too—even the best track foremen—after an astonishingly short time deteriorate, begin to be idle, to conduct business negligently, to drink, and to make false entries in the time sheets. The most decent among them leave, begging to be released—

*) “Statistical Sketch of the Personnel of the Siberian Railway.” V. E. Sentyanin. Tomsk, 1902.

**) See details in Appendix No. 2, “Extract from the Statistical Sketch of the Personnel of the Siberian Railway,” by V. E. Sentyanin.

to dismiss back to Russia at far lower salaries even than those which they had received there before their transfer to Siberia, and sometimes they leave even outright, “with a hurrah”—without hope of a position! How work proceeded under such conditions may be judged from the copy given below of one of my dispatches, sent during an inspection of work on the line on June 1, 1901.

“From Chelyabinsk to Tomsk and to Innokentievskaya to the heads of the track sections. Copy to the Head of the railway, to the Heads of the track divisions. From my inspection of the ongoing continuous replacement of rails, I have become convinced that almost everywhere this replacement, notwithstanding the Instruction issued on this subject and circular No. 5491, is being carried out incorrectly, and on some sections even in a manner plainly dangerous for the movement of trains. Thus, on almost all sections the new and old fastenings are lying for whole versts without being cleared away, allowing for the easiest theft. The bolts on the replaced rails are weakly tightened, and in places are laid not according to the drawing, so that, owing to the nearness of the dog-spike head, they cannot be properly bolted. Under some joint sleepers and under intermediate tie-plates with flanges, rotted and even undersized sleepers have been permitted, so that the edge of the tie-plates is suspended. The joints in most cases are not square. In some sleepers the adzing has been done not to the template, but crookedly, so that there is an angular gap between the tie-plate and the sleeper. Among especially serious irregularities I note: on one curve there have been laid on the right rail line, side by side, cuts of seven hundredths and twenty-three hundredths of a sazhen, while on the left rail line, opposite them, there is a cut of twenty-six hundredths. On another section, on tangent track, instead of a closure with light rails, on the right rail line there is a cut of five hundredths, and on the opposite rail line a cut of seven hundredths, and beside it, in the gap between the end of the cut and the end of the rail, a joint spike has been driven in to fill the space. Several spikes have been driven past the sleepers into the ballast, and the tie-plates have been laid askew. On the same section, for about eight versts, all the joints are not square. On tangent track, during continuous rail replacement, the track has been stitched on one section over three versts plainly by eye, namely within limits from 0.709 to 0.719 sazhen. On another section, when passing”

the train proved to be completely loose at three joints on one rail and at three joints on the other. The tie plates had been laid crookedly and askew; the joints were not square. On two sections the joint bars had been laid incorrectly, although the order of their laying is indicated in the drawing appended to the instructions. Once again I ask the Messrs. Section Chiefs to master the instructions and unswervingly demand their execution, remembering the full responsibility of the work, both in the technical respect and in the sense of the safety of movement. Telegraph receipt of this dispatch. No. 4742. Lyubimov.

It was necessary tirelessly to teach, teach, and to rely on a single stubborn persistence, for it was utterly unthinkable to resort to any serious penalties: people would leave at once.

The greatest difficulty was, and still is, the formation of a body of even experienced ordinary workers, since there were sections—for example, between Kansk and Nizhneudinsk, between the station of Zima and Irkutsk, and others—where in the working season no amount of money could procure workers at all. It was necessary to transport workers to such sections from Ob station, or from still more distant places—for example, from Kainsk and Omsk, i.e., from a distance, in the first case, of about 950 versts; in the second, over 1200; in the third, over 1500 versts! Upon the Section Chief on whose section the replacement was being carried out there then fell the far from easy duty of looking after the provisioning of the entire crowd of arriving workers, which was at times associated with enormous difficulties, in view of the absence of foodstuffs on the spot.

d) General procedure for the replacement. For the distribution of rails and fastenings, special dispatch lists*) were prepared in advance, indicating the stretches subject to replacement on each section, the number of rails, and the quantity of fastenings by types. Such lists were supplied to the Material Service, to the superintendents of its principal depots, and likewise to all Section Chiefs receiving them. As for the rules for continuous replacement and for the signaling of the works, in no way differ—

*) See Appendix No. 4.

departing from the generally accepted normal procedure for such work, there was appended to the instructions sent to the Chiefs of sections, in a quantity sufficient for distribution to all responsible agents for the replacement, a special circular*) with a somewhat more detailed statement of the circumstances of the organization of the work, in view of the extreme lack of experience not only of the lower, but in some cases also of the higher agents, who had never before had occasion to become practically acquainted with such work.

The Chiefs of sections were charged with the duty of reporting, at the end of each week, by urgent telegrams, the number of versts replaced during the week. For the manufacture of the necessary cut-off pieces, a small rail-cutting workshop was set up at Zima station, consisting of two sawing and two drilling machines with one locomotive. On each section there worked as many gangs as could be put together according to the number of rails received and the availability of road foremen experienced in the work. The initially established procedure of replacement by special road foremen—layers, independently of the district foremen, gave not entirely favorable results, in view of the negligence with which the work was carried out: the layer drove the work “at full speed,” without taking care of the proper tamping following the shifted sleepers, of proper under-shimming, of the correction of clearances, etc., additional works, as a result of which the result of the work was far from satisfactory. In the current year 1902, such separate road foremen—layers were assigned only to those districts whose road foremen were completely unfamiliar with this work; on all the others, the continuous replacement was entrusted to the local district foremen, and while they were engaged in this work, the supervision was entrusted to a special temporary seconded substitute road foreman. The result proved far more satisfactory, for each district road foreman, carrying out the replacement, knew that he himself would spoil and complicate for himself the subsequent maintenance of the district by poor work.

e) Results of the replacement. The daily success of the replacement was not everywhere the same, but depended, of course, both on local conditions

*) Circular of the Track Service No. 5491, 1901. See Appendix No. 3.

(abundance of curves) as on the personal energy of the section chief and his closest assistants, all other conditions being the same. In general, however, the average daily progress of a gang was quite small, owing chiefly to the extremely broken terrain, with an abundance of curves and engineering structures. The greatest progress of work by a gang was 1.2 versts per day for a gang of 60 men, with one track foreman and one gang elder; the smallest was 80 sazhens for a gang of 12 men, with one track foreman and one gang elder; the final progress of the work was, in general, quite satisfactory, if one takes into account that during June, July, August, September, and October of 1901 and 1902—that is, during 10 incomplete months (the shortness of the day in September and October)—nearly 900 versts of rails were changed.

ж) Prices for labor. Prices for workers on the various sections fluctuated within rather wide limits, depending on the locality and the season. The cheapest worker cost 60 kopecks, the most expensive—1 ruble 30 kopecks per day. Spike drivers received 25% more.

з) Accidents during replacement. During the two years of the mass replacement of rails, owing to a particularly fortunate course of circumstances, there were only two cases of trains derailing at places of continuous rail replacement.

The first case was with mail train No. 4; it ended quite safely, but occurred through the fault of track agents, and moreover not during the replacement itself, but two weeks after the replacement. Owing to negligent inspection by the road foreman of the laying crew, the upper bed of the sleeper was poorly swept before an intermediate tie plate with a rib was placed on it, on the outside of the track. (The standard type of tie plate for the 24-pound rail on the Siberian Railway.) On the upper bed of the sleeper there remained pebbles and lumps of frozen ballast, which, gradually pressing into it under the influence of the passage of trains, caused the tie plate to settle somewhat unevenly; the edge of the tie plate with the rib became somewhat skewed, the foot of the rail sprang out of the rib of the chair, and a widening of the track resulted.

The second case occurred no longer through the fault of the Track Service: in August 1902, train No. 31 derailed near Tulun station, owing to the station duty officer’s failure to give proper warning about the replacement; moreover, the locomotive, after passing the green signal and breaking two red signals and the detonators protecting the place of replacement, having already considerably slowed its speed after breaking the first red signal, quietly rolled down the slope of a low embankment.

V.

The Service of Heavy Rails on the Siberian Railway.

§ 14. The unexpectedness of certain circumstances that became apparent immediately after the first period of service of the heavy rails.

The experience of the two years following the first large-scale continuous replacement of light rails by heavy ones on the mountainous sections of the Siberian Railway leads, unfortunately, to entirely unexpected results. Not even ten months had passed after the first of these rails had been laid when a considerable crushing of the joints began to appear. If such a phenomenon had occurred only in one or another track district of some section; if the rails had been laid in these places in late autumn during frosts, as was the case, for example, with the rails laid in 1900—when it was impossible either to carry out or to demand proper tamping of the joints, and it was necessary for the winter temporarily to place additional ties under the joints and in other places along the length of the rail panel where the distance between the axes of the ties exceeded the standard—then the phenomenon of crushed joints could have been explained exclusively by poor tamping of the joints. But, in view of the fact that the circumstance of joint crushing was observed everywhere, even in those track districts where the rails had been laid at the very most convenient time for good work, i.e. in June, July, and August, and in districts even of the most experienced and conscientious roadmasters, it was necessary, willy-nilly, to come to the conclusion that the cause of the phenomenon lay exclusively in the excessive softness of the metal. This supposition became complete certainty when, from the section chiefs, there came a mass demand for the replacement of scarcely-

after only \(1 \tfrac{1}{4}\) years since the laying of heavy rails, so, for example, one 19th section of track alone, laid for a distance of 94 versts with heavy rails in the summer of 1901, already in August 1902 reported the need to replace, in all, 5 versts of rails, i.e. 6.3% of the total length, because of crushing not only of the joints, but also of the intermediate parts of the links. During my personal inspection in September 1902, the full correctness of the section chief’s statement was confirmed. The character of the crushing of the joints is visible in the appended phototypes Nos. IX and XII. The character of the flattening in the intermediate parts is shown in phototypes Nos. X, XI and in the drawings Nos. 30 and 31 appended at the end of the present study (sheet XVIII).

The amount of flattening over the height of the rail head reaches \(8 \tfrac{1}{2}\) mm; over the width of the head it is indicated in detail in drawing 30.

In some rails, as for example in the rail replaced at the 2485th verst (see phototype No. XII), there are through longitudinal cracks.

On sections with steep gradients, for example on the 16th section near Krasnoyarsk, where the rails were also laid in the summer of 1901, a somewhat different phenomenon is also observed: after the passage of a train, in some rails a part of the head flakes off in the form of a thin little sheet, as if of writing paper. This little sheet is quite easily torn off by hand. This phenomenon recurs after the passage of almost every train.

In rails received in 1902, whose service could not yet be determined with any clarity, there has nevertheless already become apparent a circumstance which, unfortunately, compels one to doubt their durability as well. The fact is that among them there are many bent in the horizontal plane, and the bending is not in one common curve, but in several, arranged in opposite directions, which apparently indicates the absence of proper straightening of the rails in the hot state and their rapid cooling somewhere outside in the frost, rather than gradual cooling in a covered room. At the same time, the surface of the rails is extremely rough, in places with many accretions of mushroom-shaped slag, depriving the rail of the possibility of receiving a proper rolling surface and compelling one to suppose that the ingots

No. X.

No. IX.

Types of crushing of the joint of a heavy rail.

Partnership of R. Golike and A. Vilborg.

No. XII.

Type of crushing at a joint and end crack of a heavy rail.

No. XI.

Type of crushing of a heavy rail in intermediate sections.

through the rolls directly after casting, and not after preliminary cooling and subsequent reheating in the furnace, as a result of which the slag was squeezed out during rolling*).

Especially poor with respect to flaws proved to be the rails of the Demidov works and of the “Nadezhda” Works of the Bogoslovsk works. Flaking in small sheets is observed in the rails of the same “Nadezhda” brand of the works.—Curvature and a lumpy, slagged surface are also found in the rails of the Bogoslovsk works. The poor quality of the rails stands out with particular clarity when they are compared with the service of English rails weighing 22½ pounds per running foot, brought to the mouth of the Yenisei by the well-known English captain Wiggins and laid during construction of the line in 1894, in an amount of 17 versts near Krasnoyarsk: these latter are distinguished by remarkable evenness and negligible wear, excellent rolling, and almost complete absence of crushed joints.

In terms of strength with respect to resistance to the action of frost, the indisputable superiority of these latter rails is likewise revealed. This is evident, among other things, from the appended table of heavy rails that burst in 1901.

Works brand	On level ground: on tangent	On level ground: on curve	On grade: on tangent	On grade: on curve	Total	Time of laying
Demidov	4	12	10	15	31	1900 and 1901
“Nadezhda” Works	8	14	6	6	34	1900 and 1901 »
Beloselskago	2	1	3	6	10	1900 »
English	—	—	—	2	2	1893 »

In many cases the burst rails reveal considerable non-uniformity in the structure of the metal: in the head on one side, and in the web and base on the other. (See photograph No. XIII).

§ 15. Measures for eliminating the phenomena indicated in § 14.

Dwelling on consideration of the proximate causes of the above-mentioned abnormal and extremely undesirable phenomena.

*) Other defects may be seen in Appendix No. 5.

It should be said, first of all, that it seems to me desirable that our works should, as far as possible, treat so serious a matter as the manufacture of rails more attentively, not regarding a rail exclusively from the standpoint of obtaining, for the corresponding profile, a piece of metal of known weight per linear sazhen, but as an article upon whose strength the lives of hundreds of people often depend. On the other hand, the technical specifications now in force for the supply of rails should also be amended. In this respect*:

1) One cannot but recognize, apparently, the desirability of some increase in the hardness of rail steel, especially since the experience of Russian railways has long shown, according to the statement of so authoritative a person as Engineer V. M. Verkhovsky, that the softness of the rail steel of Russian works by no means precludes breakages of such rails*).

2) It is necessary to establish, in addition to the test for fracture by means of a blow beneath the control weight, yet a separate test “for crushing” of the joints, placing the assembled rail joint, as far as possible, under the normal conditions in which it will be in the track under the impacts of rolling stock. For this purpose, for example, the joint under test could be subjected to a consecutive series of blows from a small steam hammer, with various speeds of motion of the latter.

3) It would be very useful, for the sake of assuring proper uniformity of the metal, to introduce into our technical specifications Engineer Barba’s method of testing the uniformity of the structure of the metal by means of specimens taken from the rail head by cutting these specimens in various places and breaking them off with a small monkey of 18 kilograms weight, falling from a height of 3 centimeters onto the corresponding notch**).

4) For rails delivered to roads of the far north, it is necessary, when testing with the control weight, to lower the freezing temperature to that extreme temperature which is characteristic of the locality where the rails will lie, and already in such a state to subject them to the fracture test.

) Congres International des chemins de fer. Compte rendu général. T. I. P. 290.
*) “Nouvelles études sur l’acier pour rails.” Par Anton R. von Dormus, Ch. Bulletin de la Commission Internationale du Congrès des chemins de fer. 1899. vol. XIII No. 7.

No. XIII.

Structure of the metal in a longitudinal rail of the heavy type.

5) It is desirable to carry out the same transition test from the very lowest temperature to a temperature 10–15 degrees higher; then still somewhat higher, successively reaching \(0^\circ\)—i.e., placing the rail, as far as possible, under the conditions in which it will actually have to work.

6) It is necessary to make it an obligatory condition for the mills to carry out proper straightening of the rails while still hot.

Conclusion.

In concluding the present study, I permit myself to express the most ardent wishes that, in the matter of putting in order the permanent way of the great Siberian line, every possible assistance may henceforth be rendered by the proper authorities, in the sense of increased authorization of the urgently necessary funds for the immediate mass replacement not only of the main track of the entire remaining, as yet unrelaid, level portion of the Eastern section, the Tomsk branch, and the Western section of the railway—but also of all main and passenger tracks at stations, and, first of all, the sidings, with the simultaneous replacement, on all such tracks, of light switches by the heavy type. However great the expenditure occasioned by the works enumerated may seem, it must be accepted; otherwise, with each year the danger of more or less serious accidents must increase.

Engineer L. Lyubimov.

Appendix No. 1.

Table No. 1*)

of the magnitudes of stresses in rails determined by Zimmermann’s formulas under static loading.

Condition in which the rail is found	W	R at C = 3	R at C = 4	R at C = 5	R at C = 6	R at C = 7	R at C = 8	Note
Rail of normal height, laid on 13 sleepers, length 1.15 sazhen	87	18.1	16.8	15.9	15.2	—	—	Where W = moment of resistance of the rail head. R = stress being tested, and C = coefficient of suitability of the ballast.
Same, worn by 2 mm	83	19.1	17.7	16.7	16.0	—	—	Where W = moment of resistance of the rail head. R = stress being tested, and C = coefficient of suitability of the ballast.
Same, with wear of 5 mm	80	19.8	18.4	17.4	16.6	—	—	Where W = moment of resistance of the rail head. R = stress being tested, and C = coefficient of suitability of the ballast.
Normal rail, laid on 13 sleepers, length 1.25 sazhen	87	17.4	16.2	15.3	14.6	14.0	—	Load on the wheel taken as 7000 kg.
Same, with wear of 2 mm	83	18.4	17.1	16.2	15.4	14.8	—	Load on the wheel taken as 7000 kg.
Same, with wear of 5 mm	80	19.0	17.7	16.7	16.0	15.3	—	Load on the wheel taken as 7000 kg.
Normal rail, laid on 14 sleepers, length 1.25 sazhen	87	16.9	15.7	14.7	14.1	13.3	13.0
Same, with wear of 2 mm	83	17.9	16.6	15.6	15.0	14.4	13.8
Same, with wear of 5 mm	80	18.5	17.2	16.2	15.6	15.0	14.5

*) Excerpt from pp. 137 and 158 of the Report of Engineer Mikhailovsky’s Commission.

Table No. 2

of the magnitudes of stresses in rails, determined by Winkler’s formulas and taking speed into account.

Condition in which the rail is found.	W	R at V = 25	R at V = 35	R at V = 45	R at V = 50	R at V = 60	Note.
Rail of normal height, laid on 12 sleepers, length 1.15 sazhen.	87	11.6	12.4	13.4	14.0	15.9	W = moment of resistance of the rail head R = stress. V = speed, versts per hour Load on a wheel taken as 7000 klgr.
Same, with wear of 2 mm.	83	12.2	13.0	14.0	14.7	16.7	W = moment of resistance of the rail head R = stress. V = speed, versts per hour Load on a wheel taken as 7000 klgr.
Same, with wear of 5 mm.	80	12.6	13.5	14.6	15.2	17.3	W = moment of resistance of the rail head R = stress. V = speed, versts per hour Load on a wheel taken as 7000 klgr.
Normal rail, laid on 13 sleepers, length 1.25 sazhen.	87	10.8	11.7	12.9	12.4	14.5	W = moment of resistance of the rail head R = stress. V = speed, versts per hour Load on a wheel taken as 7000 klgr.
Same, with wear of 2 mm.	83	11.3	12.3	13.5	13.5	15.2	W = moment of resistance of the rail head R = stress. V = speed, versts per hour Load on a wheel taken as 7000 klgr.
Same, with wear of 5 mm.	80	11.8	12.8	13.0	14.0	15.6	W = moment of resistance of the rail head R = stress. V = speed, versts per hour Load on a wheel taken as 7000 klgr.
Normal rail, laid on 14 sleepers, length 1.25 sazhen.	87	9.6	10.2	10.9	11.7	12.5	W = moment of resistance of the rail head R = stress. V = speed, versts per hour Load on a wheel taken as 7000 klgr.
Same, with wear of 2 mm.	83	10.2	10.8	11.4	12.5	13.3	W = moment of resistance of the rail head R = stress. V = speed, versts per hour Load on a wheel taken as 7000 klgr.
Same, with wear of 5 mm.	80	10.6	11.1	11.9	13.0	13.8	W = moment of resistance of the rail head R = stress. V = speed, versts per hour Load on a wheel taken as 7000 klgr.

Appendix No. 2.

Extract from the Statistical Essay by V. E. Sentyanin, a member of the staff of the Siberian Railway

“To become somewhat more closely acquainted with the life of the employees on the line,” says Mr. Sentyanin,* “I asked permission to send questionnaires to all station and siding chiefs and collected 118 replies.

For the most part, the replies received were brief, official statements; but some of the station chiefs described with remarkable vividness their unattractive life amid barren terrain, in places devoid of all vegetation, or amid the wild, gloomy taiga.

I shall begin with the replies concerning the climatic conditions in which the employees live.

With regard to 73 stopping points, almost identical responses were received. “The winter is severe, the summer hot. In places the frosts reach 40–45°, and in summer the heat rises to 50°.”

Owing to the marshy terrain, in the majority of cases the population living near the stations and the station agents themselves suffer from fevers and influenza, especially in spring and autumn. Midges, gadflies, mosquitoes, and other vermin are an almost universal scourge of the station population.

At some stations, in summer all the employees protect themselves from the midges with specially adapted nets; even the station chiefs meet trains in such original attire.

Children suffer especially from these troublesome insects.

The stations situated in the Baraba steppe are, in this respect, in exceptionally unfavorable conditions; for example, here is what the chief of Duplenskaya Station replied—

* See p. 29 of the Statistical Essay.

Western section. “Winter is periodically very severe; summer is terribly hot, with stifling vapors. From spring until deep autumn the population suffers from a fever of a special kind—very prolonged, without chills, but with frequent and intense heat, accompanied by delirium, aching in the legs, and a complete loss of strength. Then the surrounding population suffers from mosquitoes and midges; gnats are sometimes so numerous that from spring until the end of September life in this locality is a severe torment. In summer, during intense heat, Siberian plague develops here.”

From the Eastern section, from the stations Sorokino, Cheremkhovo, Zima, Tulun, Sheragul, Kozulka, and others, no less comforting reports have been received: swamps, fevers, mosquitoes, and so forth; gnats—these are the eloquent factors of ordinary life on the line.

True, the Eastern section is in considerably better climatic conditions: there are reports of a temperate, healthy climate, of mountainous terrain; there are even several enthusiastic reports about the climate in which the station population lives.

The chief of Shetik station, for example, gives the following report: “A very beautiful wooded locality with an unusually healthy climate. The winter is even, not especially severe. The summer is hot and dry. There are few gnats.”

In general, however, the climatic conditions on both the one and the other sections are extremely unfavorable, and places with a temperate and healthy climate are a fairly rare exception.

The water, almost along the entire line of the Western section, is either bitter-salty, or has a swampy, repulsive taste, and is completely unfit for use. There are stations to which water is delivered in tenders from the neighboring ones and carried in buckets to the apartments.

The lakes and swamps situated around the stations, in summer during the night-time, give off a mass of vapors and spread a stifling, unpleasant odor.

As regards basic necessities, the high cost, which increases with each year, sharply divides the road—

is divided into two parts. In the Western section life is considerably cheaper, and foodstuffs are delivered more easily than in the Eastern, where meat, for example, in places reaches 15 kopecks per pound; in general, the price of meat in the Western section ranges between 1 ruble 60 kopecks and 3 rubles 60 kopecks, and in the Eastern from 3 rubles 20 kopecks to 6 rubles. (Information relating to 1900.)

The difference in the cost of grain products in these two sections is also very great; bread is expensive, especially in localities approaching Irkutsk. Sugar in places reaches 28 kopecks; on average, in the Eastern section it is not cheaper than 23–24 kopecks, while in the Western it falls to 20 kopecks. Butter is from 18 to 20 kopecks in the Western section and from 20 to 40 in the Eastern.

Footwear, clothing, and linen are considerably more expensive than prices in European Russia, and their purchase presents great difficulties. Only in the large commercial centers are there shops and small stores where one can obtain more or less tolerable things. Generally speaking, in buying not only everything needed for household use, but even articles of prime necessity, extreme difficulties are encountered.

From all sides came replies that “in the local area absolutely nothing can be obtained for any money.”

“You ask,” writes one of the station chiefs, “where we get provisions. They are delivered to us by trains; if something is forgotten, one must force oneself to go hungry until the next trip by one of the employees.”

The chief of a siding in the Eastern section, Mr. Sh., told me that, having arrived at the new place of his service, he could not obtain milk for his child for any money, and fed him sugar water. (The transport of domestic animals on passes is, unfortunately, not permitted.)

I repeat—in the matter of the supply of provisions, the Eastern section is in particularly unfavorable conditions, where the population is sparser and the lines of communication are in the most deplorable state.

The chief of Kacha station reports that the station is 25 versts from a town, village, and settlement; although there are some nearby, the roads to them are impassable; “if, so to speak,

further, to make a clearing to the main road, there would be the possibility of communication with the village, the factory, and the monastery.”

The station “Kemchug” is 20 versts from the nearest village, of the same name, but communication with it is possible only in winter; in summer the road through the taiga is impassable—there are only footpaths.

If there is housing near a station, then its inhabitants are usually either some newcomer engaged in trade, sending out bread, meat, butter, and pine nuts—or coachmen engaged in cartage.

One of the serious factors in the deterioration of the way of life of railway employees is the complete absence of secondary educational institutions in the region of the Siberian line and, in general, the acute shortage of schools, educated society, reasonable amusements, etc.

To educate children in the nearest towns is far beyond the means of the majority of line employees, owing to the high cost of lodgings and maintenance; the overwhelming majority of the employees questioned expressed themselves in this sense.

The absence of educated society, the complete impossibility of satisfying one’s spiritual needs, the lack of books, of reasonable amusements, and so forth, make life on the line extremely monotonous, dull, and wearisome. Hence the excessive consumption of alcoholic beverages and card-playing, which among us has acquired the rights of citizenship.

If to all that has been said one adds the lack of tolerable housing, one obtains a very drab, everyday picture of philistine existence, and it becomes clear why precisely even somewhat increased salaries are wholly imperceptible and life on the Siberian line is, to the highest degree, difficult in the sense of both material and spiritual existence.

To my question, “are there not any purely local reasons affecting the deterioration of the way of life of the employee himself or of his family,” the answers received were extremely varied and characteristic; some of them I reproduce verbatim.

From the station “Kultulik” of the Eastern section—“The absence of society, of amusements, and of the possibility of associating with people gives rise to

the oppressive monotony of life and reduces our life to the satisfaction of animal needs alone: eating, sleeping, going on duty, etc.”

From the Kabinetskii siding (1,229 versts)—“The oppressive wilderness, the chill and damp from marsh vapors, the climate—all exhaust the organism to the point of its foundations, turning us into candidates for consumption.”

From Tatarskaya Station.—“Owing to the complete absence of amusements and of social life, and the resulting disunity of society itself, there is a mass of precedents that worsen family life.”

The chief of the siding at the 638th verst gives a rather laconic answer to this question—“boredom.”

From the siding at the 2,460th verst they write:—“There are no nearby schools, shops, transport of provisions, there is no water, except from a well, and so forth.”

From the siding at the 2,956th verst.—“A closed-in life, deprivation of society and freedom.”

From the village of Kamyshet.—“The high cost of foodstuffs and the absence of any amusements.”

From Innokentievskaya Station—“there are, I think, no worse conditions than at Innokentievskaya Station; this is, in a certain sense, exile. Prices for everything are high, means of communication are impossible (to go to Irkutsk means losing a whole day). The quarters are beneath all criticism.”

From Tinskaya Station—“The small number of people and the absence of contacts who, apart from official matters, could provide interests make life positively unbearable.”

From Cheremkhovo Station.—“Since it is impossible to lay in a stock of provisions, owing to constant thefts from cellars and storerooms, one has to overpay for all essential foodstuffs.”

From Kozulka Station.—“After serving a year, two, or three, in the taiga wilderness, a person becomes unsociable.”

The chief from Tyret Station notes the terrible high cost of labor and the high cost of servants.

The chief of the siding at the 1,073rd verst says: “the daily thefts of cattle by the Spanish woman are a heavy burden.”

“I think that these artless answers scarcely require any special commentary.”

If the conditions of service on the railway are so difficult for the lower-ranking agents, then they are only somewhat easier for the higher-ranking agents: in the period from November 1, 1901, to November 1, 1902, eleven engineers of the Ministry of Communications left the railway, and one construction engineer—altogether, therefore, thirteen people in one year!

Appendix 3.

Circular No. 5491

to the track services of the Siberian Railway on the procedure for carrying out continuous replacement of rails and sleepers.

When carrying out, in the current year, on certain sections, the continuous replacement of rails and the continuous replacement of sleepers, I most earnestly request Messrs. the Section Chiefs to adhere to the following procedure for carrying out the above-mentioned works:

I. Continuous replacement of sleepers should not be deferred until the continuous replacement of rails, in order, first, not to damage the latter by laying them on new sleepers that, in comparison with the old sleepers, have not yet settled well (the consequence of which is an extremely improper running surface and numerous small wave-like, non-vanishing deflections in the vertical plane, as well as battered joints on the joint sleepers), and, second, not in turn to spoil the new sleepers with excessive holes.

II. In cases of extreme necessity, before the continuous replacement of rails, it is permissible to replace singly only obviously unreliable sleepers: split ones, those much riddled by frequent respiking and completely unable to hold spikes. After this, the rails should be replaced throughout, and only after their replacement should the continuous replacement of sleepers be carried out; but I repeat that this is done only in the event of danger to the strength of the track, as an exception.

III. The procedure of work for the continuous replacement of rails should be established as follows: for the replacement of rails on the designated block section, it is proposed to appoint a special, fully experienced and reliable track foreman, well acquainted with continuous rail replacement, responsible only for the safe movement of traffic and for the technically correct performance of this work alone, independently of all other works in the track district of the block section where the work is being carried out. But

Since, owing to the shortage of roadmasters, it is not yet possible to form track-laying gangs under the supervision of entirely separate roadmasters for each, in some cases it will also be necessary to make use of those district roadmasters who have already carried out such renewal at their former places of service and who know this work. In such a case, after the completion of the renewal—or before it, on his own section—the roadmaster should be assigned a temporary additional remuneration, and, for the sake of the successful execution of the work, should be transferred with the entire track-laying gang to the next section requiring renewal. During the time he is engaged in this work, management of his own section should be entrusted to his senior and entirely reliable gang foreman, if it proves impossible to appoint a reserve roadmaster. If the roadmaster directing the renewal is a person other than one of the district roadmasters, then, after completion of the renewal on one of the sections, he, together with the whole track-laying gang, is to move on to another, as directed by the head of the division. In both cases the roadmaster laying the rails is to be assisted by special temporary gang foremen and by up to 20 workers, as reliable, experienced, and deft as possible, supplied with all the tools necessary for the continuous renewal of rails. It is especially important that each track-laying gang have no fewer than: a) two ratchet drills with a sufficient number of bits; b) ten fully serviceable chisels; c) one side press for straightening bent rails; d) three disc red and green signals each, namely: one red and one green signal for placing at the actual site of work; two red and two green signals for protecting the work at the statutory distance, and two red and two green for placing repeater signals if necessary; e) one set of hand red and green signals—for the roadmaster; f) three signal horns, counting one at the work itself and one each for the workers at the distant disc signals; g) three complete sets of transition fishplates, cleanly and carefully made; h) two French wrenches; i) three boxes of petards; m) two complete sets of track gauges for straight ...

and on all curves, n) a level with a straightedge and a set of templates for notching the sleepers, o) a track watchman’s car, p) a complete set of gauges, r) a copy of the present circular together with the appended instruction on the procedure for signaling track works, for the continuous replacement of rails, the continuous replacement of sleepers, tables for laying down marks, gauges, for raising and widening on curves, drawings for laying plates on curves of various radii, for laying sleepers under rails of different lengths, and types of heavy fastenings, s) a copy of the train timetable, t) an instruction on protecting track watchmen’s cars, u) a thermometer. In addition to the items listed, the track foreman must be supplied with the proper quantity of other tools necessary for the continuous replacement of rails, i.e., crowbars, shovels, wrenches, spike hammers, sledgehammers, tampers, and picks with an appropriate % reserve, so that there should never be any stoppage of work because of a shortage of tools.

IV) Particular attention must be paid to ensuring that heavy rails are in no case fastened with light fastenings. For this it is necessary: a) to impress upon the district storekeeper, and thereafter unremittingly to require and see to it, that when spikes and bolts are sent from the store to the place of work, he strictly ensures that only those boxes and barrels are sent there which have been received from the Materials Service with the stamp “T,” i.e., “heavy,” while nevertheless checking each box, in view of a possible error on the part of the Materials Service.

b) To supply the laying track foreman, and also all track foremen, not only with drawings of the heavy fastening, but also with samples of the heavy joint and intermediate spike, under the seal of the Section Chief, in order completely to eliminate the possibility of confusing the heavy and light type.

c) To instruct the Assistants to the Section Chiefs, or special technicians who will be assigned to help on each section exclusively for supervision over the continuous replacement of rails, to check daily, during the inspection of the continuous replacement, the types of fastenings.

V) It is also necessary to impress upon the laying track foremen that the transition fishplates must be sufficiently tight

are driven in at the joints, in order to eliminate the possibility of lateral play, and also the formation of extremely dangerous ledges in the vertical and horizontal planes, which in the former case may cause severe impacts and damage to the rail heads (flattening) and to the rolling stock, and in the latter—still more dangerous lateral blows, which may entail the derailment of the rolling stock. This is why it is also necessary to see to it that not only the working track-laying gang, but also the corresponding nearest track or bridge watchman to the place where the day’s work of the shift has ended, should have a spanner for the heavy and for the light type of bolts, so that with them the bolts in a joint furnished with transition fishplates may be tightened in the proper manner. In addition, each of them must have a pair of spare bolts of both types.

VI) The new fastenings must be distributed before the beginning of the work only in the amount of one day’s requirement, so that they will by no means remain scattered along the track and easily accessible to theft, as has been observed on many sections. The old fastenings obtained from the replacement likewise must not be left on the shoulder, berm, or in the ditches, but toward the end of each working day must be put away in the same boxes where the new ones had lain and taken to the storehouses of the nearest barracks, half-barracks, or, at the very least, to the yards of the track huts. The counted spikes and bolts, after proper sorting by an experienced worker, must be finally put away in the same boxes and barrels; the latter are nailed shut, and on them are marked in paint the kind, the quantity of the fastenings, and their serviceability or unserviceability. Tie plates or fishplates must be tied in bundles by means of wire. The section chiefs and their assistants are charged with the duty of strictly supervising the above-mentioned accounting, having warned the tracklayers that the cost of any fastenings lost by them will be recovered from them. Since the removed light rails and fastenings are extremely necessary for laying new tracks at almost all stations, at new sidings, and for the individual replacement of worn-out and cracked rails on the main track, while the fastenings, moreover, are needed for strengthening the fastening of light rails on

on curved and straight sections of the main track, care must be taken to prepare the removed rails for their rapid loading onto cars, the transport being carried out in whole trains. Therefore, following the gang that changes the rails, workers should be assigned to unscrew the old rails and drag them to the shoulder of the roadbed in stacks; in each stack the number of rails should be that required for a flatcar, and the distance between the stacks such that the whole train can be loaded at once.

Since loading must be as rapid as possible, the workers changing both the rails and the sleepers are brought in for it. They must be provided with a sufficient quantity of hooks, ropes, and cables. Care must be taken to ensure that there is never any shortage of fastenings, so that these do not delay the laying.

VII. Since it may happen that some portion of the heavy intermediate shims with shoulders, intended to be laid on curves, is somewhat delayed in arriving from the factories, then, in order not to delay the progress of the work, it is permitted temporarily to lay heavy rails on curves without these shims, but necessarily with four spikes at the gauge rail. In doing this, in order to reduce damage to the new sleepers, after making the notch in them according to the template and to the standard heavy intermediate shim, spikes should be driven on the inner rail as they will subsequently be after the shim is fitted, i.e., two on the inside and one on the outside. On the gauge rail it is necessary to drive two on the inside and one on the outside, as they will be after the shim is fitted, and, in addition, one additional spike on the outside of the gauge rail, as shown in the appended drawing. After the shim has been fitted, it is necessary to drive into the hole left after the above-mentioned additional spike a carefully fitted tarred birch plug and cut its top flush with the top of the sleeper, taking care that the sleepers do not split.

VIII. On all curves, the strengthening of the track with shims, according to the types given for the various radii, must also be done for two rail lengths on each of the tangents.

IX. Short straight inserts between curves (shorter than the combined length of the smooth transition curves by an insert of five sazhen) must without fail be laid continuously on tie plates.

X. In order to ensure the timely success of the continuous replacement of rails assigned for the present year, in the amount of 421 versts, it is necessary to carry out this work with track-laying crews in the following numbers:

1) XIV (former V track section) changes rails with 4 crews (34 versts)
2) XVI (former VIII „) „ „ 4 „ (91 „)
3) XVII (former IX „) „ „ 2 crews (24 versts)
4) XVIII (former X „) „ „ 2 „ (37 „)
5) XIX (new section) „ „ 4 „ (90 „)
6) XX (former XI „) „ „ 4 „ (89 „)
7) XX (former XII „) „ „ 3 „ (50½ „)
8) XXV (former XVI „) „ „ 1 „ (6 „)

At the same time: both the main and the passenger tracks, at stations as well as at sidings (and, of course, all other station tracks), within the limits between the entrance switches, are not to be laid with heavy rails, but remain with the previous light rails.

XI. The crew for the continuous replacement of sleepers must proceed behind the rail-laying crew and must be guided, with respect to the signaling of the order of the work itself, by the seven corresponding instructions appended hereto. The continuous replacement of sleepers must begin on the next day after the rail-laying crew has begun work on one or another work division. The corresponding crew section foreman begins the replacement on this division and continues it until he has completely finished the whole of his work division. The same is done by the next crew foreman in order, as soon as the rail-laying crew has worked for a day on the first verst in his work division. During the continuous replacement of sleepers, current repairs on the same work divisions must be entrusted to their older workers.

XII. Special attention during the continuous replacement of sleepers must be paid to ensuring that no ma—

pitch-pine sleepers or sleepers with signs of decay, and likewise it would be desirable to make a strict distinction between joint sleepers and intermediate sleepers, using for the former sleepers as wide as possible, i.e. with a large upper and lower bed, and seeing to it that on one and the same verst sleepers of different types are absolutely not laid. For this purpose it is necessary not only to provide the road foremen and gang foremen with drawings of the corresponding types of joint and intermediate sleepers, but the Chiefs of Sections and their Assistants are charged with the duty, under their personal responsibility, of checking the laying as often as possible and in this respect.

XIII. It is also necessary to impress upon the agents carrying out the replacement of sleepers that they must strictly see to the proper adzing of them, chiefly in the sense of an even and identical canting (undercutting), since a difference in the cant on adjacent sleepers causes irregular rolling of the rails, their screw-like distortion, and at times unsteady running of the rolling stock (rocking), with all other conditions of the track being in good order, such as proper tamping of the sleepers and true alignment of the track by level and template.

XIV. The Chief of a Section is obliged to send every evening, after the completion of work, a telegram to the Chief of Track, with a copy to the Chief of the Railway and to the Assistant Chief of the Track Service, on the number of heavy rails laid that day, and also on the total of rails replaced, in versts and sazhen, from the very beginning of the work. Concerning the complete replacement of sleepers, as well as single replacement with new sleepers (the latter to be distinguished from the former), similar telegrams are to be sent—but not every day, rather once a week, on Sundays.

I request that this circular, together with all eight appendices, be delivered against receipt to your Assistants, to the technicians supervising the laying of rails, to the road foremen—tracklayers, to the section road foremen, and to the gang foremen. Upon receipt of the copies sent to you, a corresponding dispatch must be sent by you to the Service.

Appendix No. 4.

Statement of track-laying material for the continuous replacement of rails in 1901 on the Siberian Railway.

No. of section, old division	No. of section, new division	Names of the boundaries of the replaced stretches, in versts and sazhen	Length of the replaced stretch, in versts	Rails, 24 lb., length 25′6″	Rails, 24 lb., length 28′	Rails, 24 lb., length 33′ and 35′	High sleepers, pcs.	Unadapted stock of fastening material, pcs. per sleeper	Unadapted stock of fastening material, pcs. per verst	Fishplates, internal No. 800	Fishplates, external No. 301	Baseplates, joint No. 401	Baseplates, intermediate No. 400	Bolts No. 600	Spikes, joint No. 201	Spikes, intermediate No. 200	No. of development-stage line
5	14	Anzhersk—Chernorechenskaya. from 1873 v. 292 s. to 1909 v. 182 s.	35,086	—	—	6814	68	0,340	7000	7000	14200	9200	29000	44600	229000	0
6	16	Krasnoyarsk—Yenisei. from 2039 v. 480 s. to 2043 v. 386 s.	1,436	394	—	—	8	0,029	450	450	850	450	1700	2700	11700	0
6	16	Yenisei—Zlobino. from 2044 v. 226 s. to 2051 v. 126 s.	6,800	1864	—	—	14	0,051	1900	1900	3900	—	7900	12200	37000	1
6	16	Zlobino—Zykovo. from 2051 v. 126 s. to 2069 v. 226 s.	17,776	—	—	3876	36	0,165	4100	4100	8200	11200	16700	26700	29100	2
6	16	Zykovo—Svishchevo. from 2069 v. 440 s. to 2076 verst	8,120	—	—	1770	16	0,073	2000	2000	4000	5500	8500	12000	14000	2
6	16	Svishchevo—Sorokino. from 2076 verst to 2091 v. 400 s.	13,386	—	3348	—	27	0,108	3440	3440	6950	9370	14170	21900	84200	1
6	16	Sorokino—Taezhny. from 2092 v. 112 s. to 2101 v. 81 s.	8,938	—	2236	—	18	0,072	2300	2300	4640	9620	9460	14600	59350	1
6	16	Taezhny—Komarcha. from 2101 v. 296 s. to 2115 v. 30 s.	13,468	—	3362	—	27	0,108	3460	3460	7000	7900	14260	22000	89000	1
6	16	Komarcha—Taisha. from 2115 v. 270 s. to 2125 v. 148 s.	9,756	—	2440	—	20	0,080	2510	2510	5070	2080	10390	16000	59650	2
6	16	Taisha—Balai (main line 16 and 17 sections). from 2125 v. 359 s. to 3136 verst	11,282	—	2822	—	23	0,092	2900	2900	5870	10400	11970	18500	76800	2

Note 1. For each dispatch, the agent of the Materials Service is obliged to notify by dispatch the appropriate Section Chief, indicating the day of shipment, the length and quantity of the rails being sent, or the quantity of fastenings being sent, the train No., the Nos. of the platforms or cars, and the Nos. of the waybills. In turn, the Section Chiefs are charged, upon each receipt, with telegraphing the Chief of the Track Service, with copies to the Chief of the Materials Service and to the Assistant Chief of the Track Service, Engineer Lyubimov, indicating the day of receipt, the quantity and kind of items received, the Nos. of the platforms or cars, and the Nos. of the waybills. In each such telegram, the Section Chiefs must also, without fail, indicate how much laying material of this kind they have received previously and how much remains to be received.

Note 2. The Section Chiefs are charged with the duty of telegraphing weekly, on Saturdays, to the Chief of the Railway and to the Chief of Track, with a copy to his Assistant, Engineer Lyubimov, concerning the progress of work on the complete replacement of rails, indicating: “So many versts have been replaced during the week from such-and-such date to such-and-such date, and together with the previous amount so many have been replaced, and so many versts still remain to be replaced.”

Note 3. In the column “length of the section to be replaced, in versts,” the length of the main track at stations and sidings between the entrance and exit switches is excluded.

Note 4. In the column “Nos. of order of dispatch,” the figure 0 means that the laying material is to be dispatched out of turn.

Day and month of inspection	Number of rejected rails	Time of manufacture of the rails and their size	Kind of defects
		4) 1901, II, 28	Seam on the edge of the base.
		5) 1901, VII, 28	Seam on the head.
16	3	1) 1900, XII, 28	Seam on the edge of the base.
16	3	2) 1901, III, 28	Three seams on the head.
16	3	3) 1901, I, 28	Seam.
17	2	1) 1901, II, 28	Tear on the base, on the rib.
17	1	2) 1901, II, 28	Seam on the head, on the side.
19	2	1901, III, 28	Seam on the head.
20		1) 1900, VII, 28	Deep seam on the side of the neck.
20		2) 1901, I, 28	Seam on the head, at the end face.
21	1	1901, I, 28	Seam on the head, on the side.

Drawing.

Arrangement of locomotives on the bridge with a run at 1165 v., and the position of two cars coupled behind and of the locomotive.

Visible labels and inscriptions on the drawing:

• Toward [[unclear: place name]], $27.05$
• Toward [[unclear: place name]]
• $12.00^\circ$
• $48.00^\circ$
• $10$ sazhens
• $116$ feet
• No. 905, 4-coupled
• No. 364, 4-coupled
• No. 340, 4-coupled
• No. 281, 3-coupled
• No. 282, 3-coupled
• No. 202, 3-coupled
• No. 40, 4-coupled
• No. 31, 4-coupled
• $28.00^\circ$
• $24.48$
• [[unclear: signal / post label]]
• Curve center
• Length of curve $107.78$ s.
• $R = 330$
• $21.30$
• $23.48$
• No. 660, baggage
• No. 668, baggage
• No. 668, baggage
• [[unclear: name or service designation]]
• [[unclear: postal / service car label]]
• $50.00^\circ$
• $66.20$
• To St. Slyudyanka
• Toward [[unclear: station name]]

Position of the rails at the site of the derailment of train No. 5 at verst 1765

[Diagram of the track alignment and the position of the rails. Visible labels and markings include:]

• Direction of train movement
• Trackman’s service booth [[unclear: handwritten label near the booth]]
• Point and section markings: \(a\), \(a_1\), \(a_2\), \(b\), \(b_1\), \(c\), \(c_1\), \(d\), \(d_1\), \(e\), \(e_1\), \(f\), \(g\), \(S_1\), \(S_2\), and Roman numerals I, II, III, IV.
• Additional handwritten annotations on the diagram are partly illegible: [[unclear: several small labels along the rails and at the upper end of the curve]].

Table I.

Plate II.

No. 2.

Straight plate. Wear 2 mm. Mark: O. P. Z.
Loss of weight per 1 running foot: 0.43 pound.

No. 1.

Straight plate. Wear 3½ mm. Mark: Demidov.
Total loss of weight per 1 running foot: 0.25 pound.

Table II

Sheet III.

No. 4.

Rail profile: straight line. Slope 0.007.
Wear $2\frac{1}{2}$ mm.

No. 3.

Rail profile: straight line. Slope 0.008.
Wear $2\frac{1}{2}$ mm.

Table III.

Plate IV.

No. 6

R = 150. Level track. Wear: 6 mm. Mark: O.P.Z. 1894. Loss of weight per 1 linear foot: 0.57 pound.

No. 5

R = 150. Level track. Wear: 3½ mm. Mark: O.P.Z. 1894. Loss of weight per 1 linear foot: 0.50 pound.

Table IV.

Sheet V.

No. 6.

Track profile. \(R = 150\). Gradient \(0.008\). Wear \(4\) mm. Loss of weight: \(0.75\) pound per 1 running foot.

No. 7.

Track profile. \(R = 150\). Gradient \(0.008\). Wear \(5\)–\(6\) mm. Loss of weight: \(0.84 \tfrac{1}{2}\) pound per 1 running foot.

Table V.

Plate VI.

No. 10.

\(R = 250\). Flat. Wear: 4 mm.
Brand: Demidov.
Loss of weight: 0.16 pound per 1 linear foot.

No. 9.

\(R = 250\). Flat. Wear: \(3 \tfrac{1}{2}\) mm.
Brand: [[unclear: brand not visible]].
Loss of weight per 1 linear foot: 0.64 pound.

Table VI

Plate VII.

No. 12 1/2.

Profile of the rail: \(R = 250\). Slope 0.006. Wear 4 mm. Loss in weight: 0.64 pounds per 1 linear foot.

No. 12 1/2.

Profile of the rail: \(R = 250\). Slope 0.006. Wear 8 mm. Loss in weight: 0.78 pounds per 1 linear foot.

Table VII.
Sheet VIII.

No. 14.

$R = 300$. Platform. Wear $4\frac{1}{2}$ mm. O. P. mark No. 3. 1894. Loss of weight per 1 linear ft: 0.82 lb.

No. 13.

$R = 300$. Platform. Class $4\frac{1}{4}$ mm. Mark: Demidov. Loss of weight per 1 linear ft: 0.78 lb.

Table IX.

Sheet X.

No. 18

\(R = 150.\) Grade \(0.0174.\) Wear \(4\ \mathrm{mm}.\)

No. 17

\(R = 300.\) Grade \(0.008.\) Wear \(1 \tfrac{1}{2}\ \mathrm{mm}.\)
Loss of weight: \(0.57\) pound per running foot.

Table X.

Plate XI.

No. 20.

\(R = 150\). Site. Wear 4 mm.

No. 19.

\(R = 150\). Slope 0.0174. Wear \(3 \tfrac{1}{2}\) mm.

Table XI.

Sheet XII.

Fig. 22.

Straight section. Wear 0.016. Wear 3 mm.

Fig. 21.

\(R = 150\). Platform. Wear 4 mm.

Table XII.

Plate XIII.

No. 24.

\[ R = 300 \]

Slope 0.015. Wear 5 mm.

No. 23.

Straight. Slope 0.016. Wear 3½ mm.

Table XIII.

Plate XIV.

No. 26

R = 150. Plate. Wear \(3\frac{1}{4}\) mm.

No. 25.

R = 300. Plate. Wear \(3\frac{1}{4}\) mm.

Tracing from the Longitudinal Profile as Taken in the Field for the Zima–[[unclear: station name]] Section, in Comparison with the As-Built Construction Profile

Plate XIX.
Sheet XV.

Legend:

• Black line — construction profile.
• Red line — profile as taken in the field.

Diagram labels, from top to bottom:

• Positions of the ground-profile line
• Gradients according to the construction profile
• Gradients determined in the field
• Elevations of the edge of the roadbed plus the thickness of the ballast layer, 0.16′, in the field
• Stationing
• Elevations of the edge of the roadbed plus the thickness of the ballast layer, 0.16′, according to the construction profile
• Stationing
• Ground elevations

Visible annotations within the profile:

• \(0.015 / 217\)
• \(0.002 / 150\)
• \(0.018 / 110\)
• \(0.016 / 318\)
• \(0.011 / 175\)
• \(R = 300\)
• \(R = 250\)
• \(R = 500\)
• \(R = 800\)
• \(n = 58.44\)
• \(n = 87.54\)
• [[unclear: “stone retaining wall” / note on retaining structure]]
• [[unclear: note on excavation or embankment for retaining structure]]

Dense numerical stationing and elevation entries are present throughout the diagram, but many are too small or indistinct in the image to transcribe reliably.

Outline of the rail heads of the Transbaikal, Ussuri, and Manchurian sections of track.

Table XV

Drawing 27.

Drawing 28.

Sheet XVI.

Plate XXV.

Visible labels on the graph:

• Air temperature
• Rail resistance

Graph of air temperature and atmospheric pressure for the town of Polovinka.

Temperature

Drawing 29.

24-lb rail of the Balastny Works.

Legend.

— Line of the rail head of the 24-pound rail, traced along a stretched string over a 24-foot rail.
– · – Normal outline of the rail.
— [[unclear: line designation]].

Drawing 30.

Plate XVIII.

Drawing 3.

Visible dimension markings:

• \(5/8\) [[unclear: unit or adjoining notation]]
• [[unclear: small dimension marking at the lower left of the rail head]]
• [[unclear: dimension marking along the upper slanted edge]], \(85\) [[unclear: unit]]
• \(98\) mm
• \(170\) mm
• \(84\) mm
• \(92\) mm

Plate XIII.

Right-hand.