Occasional paper on shape modification of the insulated rail joint bar, Central Queensland University, Rockhampton, Queensland, Australia, November 2007

Insulated rail joints are widely used in railway network infrastructure for connecting rail segments. Failure of this safety component might result in serious accident and life lost. One of the failure modes of the rail joint assembly is cracking of the joint bar due to the high stress. The study reported here deals with the modification of the shape of the joint bar for a lower maximum stress. Some analyses have been conducted to simulate the joint bar behaviour as close as possible to the real situation. Then, using engineering intuition, ten different shapes have been proposed. Analysis of these shapes reveals tha up to 18% reduction of the maximum von Mises stress can be gained. Furthermore, the modified shapes have a lesser volume.