Railway sleeper composed of fibre-reinforced stoneware

Abstract

A new type of railway sleeper is composed of fiber-stabilized stoneware. By using a plurality of fiber-layered stone plates bonded to one another in such a way that prestress is generated in the stoneware, a permanently high-performance-capable sleeper is obtained, which is made of natural materials such as granite or basalt which occur almost everywhere on the earth in unlimited quantities and have a substantially longer service life and are substantially more resistant to influences of the weather and the environment than previous solutions. In addition, the sleeper or the intermediate spaces thereof are equipped with photovoltaic modules which together form a power unit when they are coupled together and connected electrically to the rails. Such sleepers can also be partially hollow as a light weight design variant. Lightweight variants with a hollow profile can be filled entirely or partially with track ballast from the side during the laying process.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.