Rail shoulders are cast in the concrete railway sleepers to fix elastic rail clips and steel rail. According to different production processes, rail shoulders can be divided into cast-in rail shoulder and weld-on shoulder, and both of the two types of rail shoulders have the function of fixing elastic rail clips and protecting the rail clips from being stolen.
Cast in Shoulder is made by casting from iron, and such shoulder is used by being pre-embedded in the concrete sleepers and works with the elastic clip to fasten the rail.
For materials, cast in shoulder includes 3 types: M.C.I. shoulder by malleable iron and S.G.C.I. shoulder by malleable iron and S.G.C.I. shoulder by spheroid graphite iron.
| Material | C | Si | Mn | P | S |
| QT400-15 | 3.6-.36 | 3.0-3.2 | 0.5 | 0.07 | 0.02 |
| Qt450-10 | 3.4-3.9 | 3.7-3.0 | 0.5 | 0.07 | 0.03 |
| QT500-7 | 3.4-3.8 | 2.5-2.9 | 0.6 | 0.08 | 0.025 |
Weld-on shoulder is made by hot forging, and such shoulder is used for places where standard sleepers are unable to be easily used so the shoulders need to be welded on the flat steel base plates. In this way, it can fabricates the rail retaining units on both the steel ties and base plates, according to AREMA standard always.
Weld-on shoulders can be applied for clips with a range of 30lbs to 113lbs.
Rail Shoulder Considerations
Welded rail shoulder fixings make it possible to fabricate track fixtures on steel rail ties and steel base plates when using E-type resilient track clamps to secure the rail.
While cast rail shoulders are typically embedded in concrete rail ties, they can also be welded to longer steel rail tie sections or load-bearing beams for turnout and crossing layouts with vertical track geometry.
The ability of track shoulders to be welded in specific locations is determined by the layout design, making track shoulders very useful and cost-effective.
Rail shoulder fittings for specific track sections should be used based on design criteria to achieve the correct resilient clamp toe load. Some track shoulders are also available with milled weld area faces for better weld integrity.
