GB658683A - Improvements in or relating to a tie tamping or ballasting machine - Google Patents

Abstract

658,683. Tamping railway ballast. JACKSON, C. March 2, 1949, No. 5693. [Class 104 (ii)] A tamping machine comprises a series of vibratory tamping units, twelve being employed in an example, suspended from brackets 33 which are carried by a cross-head or tubular metal bar 20 located transversely of the rails 1 upon a carriage 4 which runs upon the rail track, the cross-head being adjustable in a vertical direction to raise and lower the tamping units, the blades of which are vibrated transversely and longitudinally of a tie or sleeper 2. Fig. 2 shows a pair of tamping units 11 mounted on one side of an arm 33 forming one of a series suspended transversely from the cross-head 20. Each tamping unit comprises a blade 17 which is bent slightly at 19 and provided with a stepped plate 171 at its lower end, the upper end of the blade being clamped upon upper and lower ears 16 on the tamping unit housing 12. The housing 12 contains an electric motor 13 with an unbalancing weight 15 eccentrically mounted upon its shaft, and the front and rear ends of the housing are provided with cross-pieces 55, 56, respectively, around which endless straps 57 of flexible, non- extensible material are passed, there being a strap at each side of a housing 12. These straps are clamped against the underside of a supporting yoke 58 which has an upstanding lug 59 clamped between the arms 60 of a hanger member which is mounted on a transverse pivot on a bracket 62 at one end of the arm 33, a similar unit being mounted at the other end of the arm. The straps 57 provide flexible or floating supports for the housings 12 which are vibrated by the unbalancing weights and thus vibrate the blades 17. The cross-head 20 is mounted in bearing couplings at the outer ends of supporting bars 24, the rear ends of which are pivoted to arms 26 hinged on a horizontal shaft 27, the movement of the cross-head being effected by a manually controlled hydraulic means comprising a cylinder 44, Fig. 8, mounted on the carriage at 45 and provided with a plunger 46 connected to the supporting bars 24 at 47. The cross-head is held against rotation by short vertical arms 36 connected through links 37, 38 to arms 39 hinged on the horizontal shaft 27, with an intermediate supporting-arm 41 connected between the link 38 and a pivot 42 on the carriage. The cross-arms 33 supporting the tamping units are thus maintained substantially horizontal. In a modification, Fig. 7 (not shown), the electric motors which effect the vibration of individual tamping blades are replaced by a single motor for each co-operating pair of blades acting upon opposite sides of a sleeper, the motors being mounted upon the cross-head and provided at each end of the armature shaft with a flexible shaft driving the unbalanced rotors of the pair of tamping units, these being mounted similarly to those shown in Fig. 1.