Anti ice build-up method on small railway culverts

Abstract

One of the most important problems with the small railway culverts operation is the ice build-up on the inlets of these structures. This problem is universal in occurrence, but the northern regions are the main danger zone. The objective of this paper is to determine the phenomenon causes and factors that directly affect it, as well as to find a way to solve the problem. A small culvert is considered as a subsystem of the «Road/Railroad» system, which allows us to execute complete analysis and description of the technical and special production processes accounting related to design, construction, maintenance, scheduled, overhaul, as well as reconstruction, and solution of some problems, during the culverts operation. Consistently considered reliability issues during structural engineering: functional, structural, and informational. described Regulations that allow determining the nature of the ice build-up problem on pipes. In the analysis process of the existing methods for solving the problem, it was found that each method has its particularities, but in the end, is ineffective. According to the methodology presented by the authors, under Professor’s Yu.L. Scheviev supervision, has been developed a completely new approach, that provides effective financial resources use, in relation to the work result during the entire object’s life cycle, in form of a long structure operation period with the elimination of the ice build-up problem possibility. Technique application leads to a sharp decrease in the technical work frequency at small culverts. The paper analyzes a detailed algorithm for using the technique based on the calculation of a small culvert with a circular cross-section.