Rail joint bars and rail joint assemblies
AssigneePortec Rail Products, Inc.
InventorsW. Thomas Urmson, Jr., John W. Mospan, John M. Downey
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Abstract
A rail joint assembly is provided for joining abutting railroad rails with an electrically-insulated joint. The rail joint assembly comprises abutting railroad rails compressing an insulating gasket therebetween and rail joint bars secured through a plurality of holes by fasteners to the adjacent railroad rails. The rail joint bars comprise a body and an insulating spacer comprising a porous mesh screen and washer. A layer of epoxy is sandwiched between a rail joint bar and railroad rail and comprises a rigid epoxy on lateral portions of a first side of a rail joint bar and a flexible epoxy placed on a central portion of the first side of a rail joint bar. Rail joint bars are rectangular shaped and may have a cutout.
Claims9
An electrically-insulating spacer arrangement for positioning between two adjacent rail ends, comprising a body and a first gasket, the body having a T-shaped profile corresponding to an end face profile of the rail ends and the first gasket having a profile which is different from the T-shaped profile of the body,
- wherein the body comprises an electrically-insulating material that is substantially incompressible and has at least a first face and defines a single first gasket-receiving groove on the first face, and
- wherein the first gasket is received by the single first gasket-receiving groove on the first face, extends beyond the first face of the body and is a compressible electrically-insulating gasket coacting with the body, and wherein the first gasket covers only a portion of the first face of the body before compression of the first gasket occurs.
An electrically-insulating spacer arrangement for positioning between two adjacent rail ends comprising a body, wherein the body comprises an electrically-insulating material that is substantially incompressible, and a compressible electrically-insulating gasket coacting with the body, wherein the compressible gasket covers only a portion of the electrically-insulating material before compression of the compressible gasket occurs, and
- wherein the body has a T-shaped profile corresponding to an end face profile of the rail ends and the gasket has a profile which is different from the T-shaped profile of the body.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.