Railways are using optical fibre sensing networks to switch from scheduled to condition-based and predictive maintenance, explains Shun-Yee Liu, Hwa-Yaw Tam, and Kang-Kuen Lee from Hong Kong Polytechnic University’s electrical engineering department, and Kei-Chun Cheng from Volant Railway Technologies, Hong Kong.
Colas Rail has long had a desire to expand its rolling stock maintenance business, and took a major step forward in October 2016 by establishing a new French subsidiary, Ramfer. Dan Templeton visits the company’s hub in Grenay, France, to get a closer look at how it is managing its maintenance activities.
SIEMENS announced on August 9 that it is establishing a new locomotive service hub at New Castle, Delaware, to remotely monitor the operation of Siemens locomotives across the United States.
CAF’s Miira business unit, which specialises in the design and manufacture of wheelsets and couplers, has acquired Rifer, an Italian rail vehicle and wheelset maintenance company.
Fitting monitoring equipment to commercially-operating trains to provide an in-depth analysis of track conditions is becoming increasingly common. The team from the Track Technology Research Laboratory at Japan’s Railway Technical Research Institute (RTRI)* reflect on their work to process data retrieved from this process and show how it can inform a preventative track maintenance strategy.
Network Rail is currently transitioning to a predictive and preventative infrastructure maintenance strategy. Kevin Smith charts the progress made so far and picks up on some of the challenges the infrastructure manager is facing.
CBH Group, Australia, has awarded a contract to Wi-Tronix, United States, to equip its fleet of 25 diesel-electric locomotives, which are used to haul grain trains, with Wi-Nostix, a predictive fault diagnostics and monitoring system.
STADLER Rail Services UK has awarded BAM Nuttall a contract worth around £20m to construct a new depot at Kirkdale in Liverpool which will maintain the fleet of 52 four-car EMUs ordered last month by Merseytravel for the Merseyrail suburban network.
CAF announced on February 6 that it has been awarded a contract by Paris Transport Authority (RATP) for the design and manufacturing of dual-mode electric locomotives.
KIWIRAIL enters 2017 facing a number of short and long-term challenges, and how these issues are tackled will determine the future nature and extent of railway services in New Zealand over the coming decades.
