Recommended Citation

It has been desirable for years to develop non-intrusive/non-invasive procedures to determine the pressures and stresses at various levels and interfaces in the railroad track structure in order to optimize track designs and improve subsequent track performance. Recent research has developed satisfactory procedures for measuring pressures in the track structure at the ballast/subballast/subgrade levels using earth pressure cells. The research reported in this thesis documents the development of a technique for measuring the pressures in the track, at the rail/tie plate/tie interfaces, using a very thin pressure sensitive Tekscan sensor. The Tekscan Measurement System uses a sensor composed of a matrix-based array of force sensitive cells, similar to mini strain gauges, to obtain accurate pressure distributions between two surfaces in the track. This thesis specifically describes: 1) the optimum procedure to install the sensors into the track, 2) the recommended practices to effectively collect data with the software, and 3) the accepted techniques for analyzing the results. Both laboratory calibration and in-track testing have been conducted and th