Measurement of undulatory wear along railroad tracks

Claim 2

In a method of measuring undulatory wear of a rail of a railroad track comprising moving along the track a unit in-cluding a rail sensor sensitive to deformations in relation to a given measuring base, within which said sensor is disposed the im-provement comprising simultaneously using several measuring bases of different lengths, and a plurality of sensors each disposed within a respective one of said bases to measure amplitudes of deformations detected relative to the respective bases and provide electric output signals representing the measured amplitudes, the lengths of said measuring bases being each chosen to provide mea-surements corresponding to undulations of given wavelength values, and the length of each successively shorter measuring base being related to the length(s) of the longer one(s) to permit measure-ments of undulations of wavelength values not provided by said longer one(s), said separate output signals obtained by the sen-sors for each rail may all be analysed for determining the quality of the rail surfaces.

Claim 3

A method according to claim 1, further comprising simultaneously recording the separate measurements of all of the sensors of said measuring bases.

Claim 4

A method according to claim 1, further comprising comparing the simultaneous measurements of all of the sensors of said measuring bases, and recording whichever of said measurements instantaneously has the greatest value.

Claim 5

A method according to claim 1, further comprising graphically recording the measurements of the sensors of said measuring bases.

Claim 6

A method according to claim 1, further comprising magnetically recording the measurements of the sensors of said measuring bases.

Claim 7

In a device for measuring undulatory wear of a rail of a railroad track, comprising a unit movable along the track, wherein said unit includes means defining a given measuring base and a rail sensor sensitive to deformations in relation to said measuring base, within which said sensor is disposed, the impro-vement wherein said unit includes means defining several measuring bases of different lengths and a plurality of sensors each dis-posed within a respective one of said bases to measure amplitudes of deformations detected relative to the respective bases and provide electric output signals representing the measured ampli-tudes, the lengths of said measuring bases being each chosen to provide measurements corresponding to undulations of given wave-length values, and the length of each successively shorter mea-suring base being related to the length(s) of the longer one(s) to permit measurements of undulations of wavelength values not provided by said longer one(s), said separate output signals ob-tained by the sensors for each rail may all be analysed for de-termining the quality of the rail surfaces.

Claim 8

In a device for measuring undulatory wear of a rail of a railroad track, comprising a unit movable along the track, wherein said unit includes means defining a given measuring base and a rail sensor sensitive to deformations in relation to said measuring base, within which said sensor is disposed, the impro-vement wherein said unit includes means defining several measuring bases of different lengths and a plurality of sensors each dis-posed within a respective one of said bases to measure amplitudes of deformations detected relative to the respective bases and provide electric output signals representing the measured ampli-tudes, the lengths of said measuring bases being each chosen to provide measurements corresponding to undulations of given wave-length values, and the length of each successively shorter mea-suring base being related to the length(s) of the longer one(s) to permit measurements of undulations of wavelength values not provided by said longer one(s), said separate output signals ob-tained by the sensors for each rail may all be analysed for de-termining the quality of the rail surfaces.

Claim 9

A device according to claim 6, in which said means defining each measuring base comprises a girder, and first and second rollers running along the rail, supporting the girder, each girder being associated with a rail sensor intermediate said first and second rollers.

Claim 10

A device according to claim 7, in which each rail sensor comprises a third roller movably mounted relative to the respective girder.

Claim 11

A device according to claim 7, in which each rail sensor comprises detection means supported by the respective gir-der out of contact with the rail.

Claim 12

A device according to claim 6, comprising first, second and third measuring bases of successively decreasing length, said second and third measuring bases being diposed within said first measuring base,

Claim 13

A device according to claim 10, comprising first, second and third girders defining said first, second and third measuring bases, a respective pair of rollers supporting each one of said girders and running along the rail, and supporting rol-lers connecting said second and third girders to opposite ends of the first girder.

Claim 14

A device according to claim 11, in which the rail sensors of said second and third girders each comprise a third roller movably mounted relative to the respective girder, and the rail sensor of the first girder comprises an independent support-ing roller of one of the second and third girders.

Claim 15

A device according to claim 11, in which each rail sensor comprises detection means supported by the respective gir-der out of contact with the rail.