Rail Engineer • December 2016
Heavy and light track slab Chris stated that about 64 per cent of the track required in the tunnels has been installed. This is not an easy calculation because there are five different types of track being used, including: »» Standard slab track which forms 80 per cent of the track on the new railway - 70 per cent complete; »» Direct fixed track using Australian Delkor two-holed baseplates to reduce dynamic stresses and installed throughout the Victorian Connaught Tunnel - 100 per cent complete; »» High-attenuation sleepers, similar to standard slab
LIGHT RAIL/METRO
and each one has the capacity to carry and position 28 sleepers at a time ready to receive new continuously welded rail. A total of 70,000 sleepers are being installed. These are manufactured in Nottingham by SBC Rail and then stockpiled in bales at the railhead depots at Plumstead Logistics Centre in south east London and Westbourne Park temporary railhead in West London. Both locations are being used throughout the contract for providing engineer trains and for storing materials and equipment. The Plumstead railhead is going to be the permanent infrastructure maintenance depot for Crossrail. British Steel is supplying more than 57km of heattreated, wear-resistant rail. The steel blooms are produced in its Scunthorpe plant but the slight surprise is that these blooms are then transported to Tata’s Hayange mill in northern France to be rolled and finished. Apparently, that’s where the heat-treatment furnaces are.
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track, used in a few areas where noise and vibration need to be kept to a minimum – 25 per cent complete; »» Floating track slab light, used to reduce noise and vibration in the Soho area – 50 per cent complete. »» Floating track slab heavy, with a high iron ore content which doubles the density of normal concrete, is being used in the most sensitive areas such as under the Barbican Centre - work just starting. ATC JV also invested in a refurbished concreting train in August 2015. It is a 465-metre-long mobile underground concrete batching factory using dry materials. Chris explained that running and maintaining the concreting train is a 24-hour operation. Concrete pouring takes place during the night with restocking and maintenance carried out during the day.
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