A Lowering Friction Treatment for Railway Materials

While the energy efficiency of railway transportation is quite high in comparison with that of the roadway transportation, there are still some aspects that preclude any greater efficiency for this transportation mode. Specifically, during the negotiation of turns, some locomotive energy is lost due to the rubbing of the wheels´ flange with the rail head, being the amount of such an energy a function of a multitude of parameters that are car- and track- related. In this paper, a carburizing treatment is proposed to reduce the friction between the rail and the wheel´s flange, involving the selective carburizing of the lateral surface of one of the rail head´s sides. The proposed furnace´s design is supposed to the installed next to the hot-rolling facility and includes the needed equipment to avoid decarbonization of the non-treated rail material