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Mechanical Testing of Innovated Composite Polymer Material for using in Manufacture of Railway Sleepers

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Abstract

Faculty of Engineering at Shoubra has been funded to start a project for manufacturing railway sleepers from plastic wastes and iron slag to replace imported wooden sleepers. In this paper, performance of wooden sleepers in tracks of Egyptian Railways, including high cost and material defects as well as reasons to find out a new sleeper will be presented. Previous studies for using composite materials in manufacturing railway sleepers are illustrated. Mechanical testing has been carried out to determine the important properties of the new mixture; hence results are compared with the minimum requirements of the international railway standards. Linear analysis has been conducted using 3D-SAP2000 software to simulate the actual performance of the proposed sleeper. It is found that the testing results are larger than the required values. Thus; it is concluded that the tested material is effective and adequate to be used in manufacture of railway sleepers.

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Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank all staff of the Unit of Project Development in Ministry of Higher Education in Egypt, Benha University, Egyptian National railways and National Authority for Tunnels for their cooperation in providing the fund to purchase the required materials and to conduct the required testing. Also, the author thanks the engineers and technicians of the Egyptian Company for Manufacturing of Resin Products.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Civil Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering at Shoubra, Benha University, Cairo, 11629, Egypt

    Ahmed Abdelmoamen Khalil

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  1. Ahmed Abdelmoamen Khalil
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Correspondence to Ahmed Abdelmoamen Khalil.

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Khalil, A.A. Mechanical Testing of Innovated Composite Polymer Material for using in Manufacture of Railway Sleepers. J Polym Environ 26, 263–274 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10924-017-0940-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10924-017-0940-6

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