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Testing railway tracks at 1:1 scale at CEDEX Track Box

CTB has been used since its construction, 12 years ago to research on different matters of rail
way tracks founded on hard soils such as: measurement of track vertical stiffness under different
track conditions, determination of track lateral stability, determination and interpretation
of ballast permanent settlement curves in fatigue tests, calculation of rail deflections under
the pass-by of trains at very high speeds, up to 450 km/h, behaviour of sleepers with USP,
optimization of bituminous sub ballast thickness, , behaviour of High Speed Lines subjected to
mixed traffic and calibration of 3D numerical models.
Furthermore, it can be also used to study the influence of ground irregularities in the behaviour
of slab tracks, to optimize the maintenance works in slab-ballast transition zones or to analyse
the ballast degradation in switches or crossings.
The recent deployment of a 3 Hz natural frequency spring system at the base of CTB will allow
in the future to assess experimentally the behaviour of ballasted and slab tracks founded on
soft soils.
6. References

• CUÉLLAR, V. (2016). Comportamiento dinámico de líneas férreas con balasto bajo cargas
verticales. Ingeniería Civil 183, pp. 79-108.
• ESTAIRE, J., CUÉLLAR, V. y CÁMARA, J. L. (2017). Settlement laws of bed layers of a
ballast track as determined in 1:1 scale models performed in CEDEX Track Box. Int. Conf.
Transportation Geotechnics and Geoecology (to be published)
• ESTAIRE, J., y SANTANA, M. (2017). Large direct shear tests performed with fresh ballast (to
be published in Symposium on Railroad Ballast Testing and Properties, ASTM, 2018).
• ESTAIRE, J., CUÉLLAR, V. y SANTANA, M. (2017). Track lateral stability tests performed in
CEDEX Track Box and their modelling. Revista Geotecnia, nº 140 – July 2017 (pp. 03-30)
• FRYBA, L. (1999). Vibration of solids and Structures under Moving Loads. Thomas Telford.
• KISH, A. (2011). On the fundamentals of track lateral resistance. AREMA.

• MANZANAS, J., MORENO, J., CUÉLLAR, V., ANDREU, M.A. y NAVARRO, F. (2007). CEDEX´s
experimental facility for testing railway tracks. Proc. 14th European Conf. Soil. Mech. Vol
4, 2037-2055.
• RIVAS. Deliverable D3.7 Part A. (2013) Results of laboratory tests for ballasted track
mitigation measures. CEDEX Track Box.
• SAMAVEDAM, G., SLUZ, A. y KISH, A. (1999). The effect of realignment on track lateral
stability. AREMA

7. Acknowledgements

The authors of the paper want to acknowledge all the people who have worked in CTB during
all its working life: Francisco Navarro, Miguel A. Andreu, Juan L. Cámara, Ricardo Fernández,
Francisco González, Inés Crespo, Raul Reinoso, Ángel Carballo, Gema Villar. Pedro León, Antonio
García, José M. Cerezo y José L. F. Rocha.

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