Report

Teaser, summary, work performed and final results

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - PIVOT (Performance Improvement for Vehicles on Track)

Teaser

The European railway manufacturers and suppliers are challenged by low acquisition cost products generally offered from Asia. With the help of the Shift2Rail programme, the European railway industry is in a great position to respond to this competitive challenge through the...

Summary

The European railway manufacturers and suppliers are challenged by low acquisition cost products generally offered from Asia. With the help of the Shift2Rail programme, the European railway industry is in a great position to respond to this competitive challenge through the biggest strength of the European industry; innovation.
PIVOT is contributing to the vision and goals of Shift2Rail (increasing cacacity and reliability together with reducing the life cycle cost) by focusing on the “Performance Improvement for Vehicles On Track” around all mechanical units of a vehicle - starting from the carbody roof down to the wheel.
This first issue of the reporting presents the main results and findings of the first 15 months of cooperation of the PIVOT consortium. Its work plan contains activities of TD1.3 Carbody, TD1.4 Running Gear, TD1.5 Brakes, TD1.6 Doors and TD1.7 Modular Interiors. Each one will be represented in dedicated Work Packages aiming at providing valuable input for the success of the respective IP1 Technology Demonstrators (TD).

Work performed

Through Shift2Rail, the project results will contribute to a new generation of rail vehicles. Technologies studied in this project will be further developed during the follow-up project “PIVOT-2” and will have an impact beyond the Shift2Rail programme after 2022.


• WP1
During this first period, WP1 has been prepared the technical specification of the different demonstrators taking into account structural criteria, EMC requeriments, thermal requeriments or the maintenance of the future hibryd structures. Finally, four different demonstrators have been defined covering different range of products and conditions (metro and main lines). The main drivers for the developments will be weight reduction and cost reduction, through functional integration and simplification of the assemblies.

• WP2
Once the specifications have been released for the different demonstrators the partners have been working in the demonstrator´s conceptual designs. During this period the studies has faced different technical difficulties to reach the engineering requirements. Everyone has its own particularities depending on the different functionalities. Multiple laminates, thicknesses, component split, materials, and processes have been analyzed in other to find the most suitable for each demonstrator.

• WP4
During the first reporting period it has been focused on the following strategies: elaboration of a technical specification of High Performance Running Gear, development of new lightweight materials for primary structures and novel Methodologies to estimate the Noise and Vibration transmission emited by the Running Gear.

• WP5
The PIVOT work package WP5 “Brake” aims at the development future brake system concepts based on new approaches and complementary technologies. The first 18 month of technical work within WP5 was characterized by specification work in the different areas of activities: SIL3/4 brake control electronics, electro mechanic brake, linear eddy current brake, friction pairing and virtual certification. During the analysis phase within PIVOT, it became clear that the development of the eddy current brake lacked both the market and the legal support for broader acceptance in Europe. The work on this activity has been therefore stopped by end of September 2018.

• WP6
During this first 15 months, the first main action of WP6 „Doors“ consists in the delivery of the General Specification of Entrance System used as the base for the detailed specifications of gap filler and door leaves. In this period, it has been started the technical studies on boarding aids with the pre-selection of 3 sketches of solution. In parallel, a benchmark of off the shelf sensors has been done to check the feasibility of different functions like platform detection, passenger detection, obstacle detection, passenger counting, “pushbutton” function and to measure the improvement and customisation to do to fufill the functions. As for the leaves, it has been performed benchmark and research study on composite materials (resins, fibers and filling materials) and on “out of autoclave” processes. On the metallic leaves, acoustic and thermal study and some feasibility mechanical calculation on the innovative solutions have been performed.

• WP7
PIVOT WP7 is split in two main tasks Interiors and Cabin.During this period the progress achieved for INTERIORS have been to identify the needs with a definition of “modularity” and to build and validate the main needs. For CABIN, the progress achieved have been to realise an .Innovative design workshop on « cabin of the future ». All participants have proposed and shared ideas during the workshop and conclude this first year with a common roadmap for 2 years, 5 years and after 5 years.

Final results

• WP1&2
The use of new material allows to the rolling stock manufacturers to reduce the mass and the energy needed to move the trains. This reduction of the mass of carbodies (an others component of the train in which the material could be used) allows train with an increased capacity and more comfort and technologies passengers’ oriented.

• WP4
The challenge in WP4 is to develop and combine adequately suitable technologies to produce light, low noise, track friendly, reliable and cost-efficient maintenance focusing in the achievement of the following objectives: Increase of reliability and punctuality, capacity and LCC reduction of Running Gears.

• WP5
The work in the field of electro-mechanic brake and SIL3/4 brake control electronics will be completed with investigations of first demonstrators in the laboratory. On the basis of the investigation results, the next step within the follow-up project intends to implement improvement measures along with a partial implementation on the train.
Furthermore, the investigation on virtual certification processes for the brake system results into first defined and agreed virtual certification methods for brake sub systems to shorten their certification processes.

• WP6
WP6 aims also to introduce composite solutions in the doors and proceeds to a research on materials and manufacturing process. The cost has become in one of the most critical engineering aspects of the development. With important fire and smoke constraints, WP6 compares thermoset resins, honeycombs or foam as filling materials and glass or carbon fibers in parallel with manufacturing process “out of autoclave” process like infusion, Resin Transfer Molding, hand-layup. Based on the results, the composite leaves will be developed in a next phase.

• WP7
The ambition of the TD1.7 is to give the keys to adapt the train: always, anytime and anywhere with cost-effective design. It is why the Modularity of the interiors design is the red line of the project.

Website & more info

More info: https://projects.shift2rail.org/s2r_ip1_n.aspx.