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Article: Better lubrication cuts rail wear dramatically: a more consistent and comprehensive approach to rail lubrication on London Underground's Circle Line has dramatically reduced rail wear.(Track)
- Article from:
- International Railway Journal
- Article date:
- May 1, 2004
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2004 Simmons-Boardman Publishing Corporation. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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LONDON Underground's 22.5km Circle line, which is now the responsibility of Metronet Rail, has some very sharp curves which have given rise to very high rates of rail wear despite the line being fitted with lubricators. "We were having a lot of problems," Mr Arun Bhalla, track services manager with Metronet Rail, explained. "We had uneven rail wear in certain sections, and very high rail wear in some cases causing us to change the rails every 18 months instead of every 18 years. We also had rail snowing where fine particles of steel would cause block joints to fail. Consequently our maintenance costs were very high. We seemed to be fire fighting rather than predicting our ...