Direct support frog assembly

A frog assembly mounted on a base plate and having a fixed wing, longitudinally extending railroad frog casting and securely clamped between a pair of wing rails at the intersection of a mainline rail and a turnout line rail comprising:

• said railroad frog casting having a planar, longitudinally-extending bottom support surface;
• a heel end;
• a heel extension adapted to be attached to a pair of heel rails;
• a frog point integral with said heel end defined in part by said bottom surface, a pair of diverging side surfaces and a top surface which defines a mainline running surface and a turnout line running surface for railroad car wheels;
• and a toe end having a first wing and a second wing each defined in part by said bottom surface, an outer longitudinally extending perimeter side wall and a top wheel running surface;
• wherein said first and second wings lie on opposite sides of and extend forwardly of said frog point and extend parallel to and are spaced laterally from one of said diverging side surfaces of said point to define a flangeway groove therebetween;
• said first wing rail having a base with a bottom surface which rests on said base plate and a pair of opposed inclined fishing surfaces connected by a web to a head having a mainline wheel running top surface and a pair of opposed inclined fishing surfaces and said second wing rail having a base with a bottom surface which rests on said base plate and a pair of opposed inclined fishing surfaces connected by a web to a head having a turnout line wheel running top surface and a pair of opposed inclined fishing surfaces;
• said first wing rail having a first wing receiving section which complements and extends parallel to said perimeter side wall of said first wing and receives said first wing and a first guard rail section and said second wing rail having a second wing receiving section which complements and extends parallel to said perimeter side wall of said second wing and receives said second wing and a second guard rail section;
• wherein the top wheel running surfaces of said first and second wings are parallel to said mainline and said turnout line wheel running surfaces of said wing rails and said bottoms of said first and second wings are parallel to the bottom surface of said first and second wing rails;
• wherein said railroad frog casting is freestanding such that substantially the entire bottom surface of said casting is spaced from and interposed between the base of each of said wing rails such that said entire bottom surface of said casting rests upon said rail plate;
• aligned bores formed in said first and second wing rails and said railroad frog casting;
• a bolt assembly having a smaller diameter than said aligned bores mounted in said aligned bores to clamp said railroad frog casting between said first and second wing rails;
• and
• wherein said bolt assembly is sized sufficiently smaller than said aligned bores to allow limited vertical movement of said railroad frog casting with respect to said first and second wing rails to ensure that any wheel loads imposed on said frog casting are transmitted to said base plate and are not taken by said bolt assembly.