rackrail

A rail laid alongside the bearing rails of a railway, and having cogs into which meshes a cog-wheel on the locomotive. Now only to be found in some forms of inclined-plane rail rack-railway, s . A railway operated by means of a rack rail. Rack-railways are in use in many countries of Europe, in Syria, Sumatra, Japan, Mexico, Brazil, Chile, Venezuela, the West Indies and the United States. That such railways are taken advantage of is shown by the fact that in rack-tail, s. 3339 Horol.: A bent arm connected with the toothed segment-rack, by which the striking mechanism of a repeating clock is let off.