Review on short pitch rail corrugation studies

Short pitch rail corrugation on tangent track has been a problem for railways for more than a century. Rail corrugation is associated with noise nuisance and increased maintenance cost. A century of research in many countries world-wide, has provided a wealth of information and insight. When placing the researches in the right historical perspective, the outcome of these researches can be paralleled with present day state of the art on engineering and manufacturing of railways and its assets. In this paper, short pitch rail corrugation studies are reviewed and placed in this historical perspective. (C) 2008 K.H. Oostermeijer. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.