Mitigation of sub-surface crack propagation in railroad rails by laser surface modification

The authors address the mitigation of sub-surface crack propagation in railroad rails via laser surface modification. The goal is to reduce the shear forces from rail-wheel friction, which contribute significantly to the nucleation and propagation of cracks in the sub-surface region at rail gage corners. Microhardness scans and tensile tests were performed on samples from cross-sections of unused and heavily used rail heads. The results of these tests indicate that the severe cyclic plastic deformation that occurs at the gage corners, during service, significantly hardens the sub-surface region there, which leads to cracking. Laser glazing, the rapid melting and rapid solidification of a thin surface layer, was used to reduce the friction coefficient of rail steel. The advantages of this process are that specific regions of the rail surface can be targeted; the treatment does not wash away as the currently used liquid lubricants do; it is more environmentally sound than liquid lubricants; and it can be applied in service, during re-work or during rail fabrication. A number of laser treatments were conducted on AISI 1080 steel plates, similar to rail steel, from which friction samples were extracted. Static block-on-ring friction experiments performed on a variety of laser treated surfaces showed reductions in the friction coefficient by about 25% relative to untreated surfaces at loads corresponding to prototypic rail service loads. The authors laser-glazed two areas on the top surface of a 6-ft length of rail with multiple pass treatments, one with adjacent passes overlapping, and one with adjacent passes separated by 1 mm. Friction measurements were made after they were subjected to 20,000 run-in cycles. The laser treatments remained intact after these cycles. Reductions of friction coefficient of ca. 40%, relative to untreated surfaces, were observed, corresponding to a reduction in the calculated mixed mode crack propagation rate by ca. 79%