Sujetos del procedimiento administrativo

Rolling Stock. Efficient low-weight rolling stock has always been of interest to railway op-erators. Low weights provide higher load capac-ities with lower energy consumption and enable higher vehicle accelerations when starting and higher vehicle deceleration on braking, as well as a reduction in rail wear. These advantages are mainly utilized by local traffic with its many stops, e.g., underground trains, but also by long distance traffic, in particular, high speed rail traffic.

Toward the end of the 1920s, the transfor-mation of weight reduction in rolling stock re-sulted in the replacement of steel internal fittings by fittings made in aluminum alloys, initially in passenger carriages. However, in 1934, the Bal-timore and Ohio Railroad Company, at that time

one of the largest North American Railway com-panies, had built for them, excluding the con-ventional locomotive design, an aluminum ex-ample of the semistreamlined steam-powered

“Royal Blue,” traveling between Chicago and St. Louis [Hug 44]. Only the wheel trucks, cou-plings, and buffers of the eight passenger cars were made in steel, all other components from alloys of the alloy group AlCuMg. Long ex-truded profiles were used for the load-carrying components of the car underframe. Even the col-umns of the side walls were made of extruded profiles, which were also used for the necessary stiffening in other places in the carriage. Formed sheets in the same aluminum alloy were used for the cladding of the carriage walls, for the train car roof as well as for the floor.

Sections and sheet were joined together with rivets and arc welding. In addition, the internal fittings of the carriage, for example, the tables and seats in the dining car, also were made from aluminum alloys. The eight carriages built com-pletely from aluminum had a total weight of 350 metric tons in contrast to the identically con-structed steel carriages with 650 metric tons, i.e., 54% of the weight of the steel carriages.

Fig. 2.11 Diesel power car of the Trans Europa Express (TEE) on the Rhine section

Fig. 2.12 Carriage body of the Trans Europa Express (TEE) in riveted and spot-welded ALMgSi sheets with lon-gitudinal and transverse stiffeners in extruded sections of the same alloy in the heat treated temper

The desire to reduce the weight of rolling stock by using aluminum alloys continued to de-velop after World War II. In the second half of the 1950s, the German Rail Company operated several of the advanced for the time fast diesel locomotives designated VT 11.5 with a maxi-mum speed of 160 km/h for the lucrative long-distance service.

The carriages were made from riveted and spot-welded AlMgSi1 sheets with longitudinal and transverse stiffeners in extruded solid AlMgSi1 sections. Both types of semifinished products were used in the age-hardened temper.

Only the main transoms in the under frame of the carriage as well as the wheel trucks and cou-pling carriers were made in St52 steel as well as the coupling system. Figure 2.11 shows this diesel train on the Rhine section, and Fig. 2.12 shows a cross section of the conventionally built and thus correspondingly expensive carriage.

The multiunit railcar train shown in the pho-tographs with its design that is still modern by today’s standards traveled as the Trans Europa Express (TEE) in Inter-European long-distance travel. It consisted of five carriages as well as the two power cars, each with a diesel engine, at the front and the back. The basic concept of this diesel multiunit railcar, two external power cars with the carriages in between, is practically the basis of the German InterCity Express trains ICE1 and ICE2 used today.

During the postwar decades, the European na-tional railways built their rail networks initially

for train speeds up to 200 km/h, speeds that could be achieved using electric locomotives. In the context of the further technical development of the wheel/rail system, the tracks have been prepared in the past 10–15 years for significantly higher speeds. In the near future, the European railways are targeting future high-speed rail traf-fic with speeds of 350 km/h (220 mph). Large advances along this path have been made by the French national railway SNCF with its TGV,

which set a world record of 515 km/h (320 mph) on test runs. In the next 20 years in Europe, a certified rail network for high-speed trains with multiple current systems and corresponding sig-nal and control systems will develop in Europe to allow inter-European long-distance trains to travel the national rail networks. These stretches are operated for inter-European long-distance train travel with train concepts that do not follow the previously conventional train system of “a locomotive with carriages.” One example is the Eurostar, a special design of the TGV with a multiple current system that can travel between Paris and London in three hours through the Channel Tunnel. The ICE3 of the DB follows a similar concept.

From this perspective, the European railway operators have a vital interest in trains with the lowest possible weight for the high-speed rail network as described previously. Low weights minimize the energy requirements for powering these trains as well as the wear of the tracks and permit high accelerations when starting and de-celerations on braking.

The big breakthrough for the economical ap-plication of aluminum alloys in carriage con-struction was the development of the large pro-file technology in the 1970s by Alusuisse. This enabled rolling stock to be entirely and eco-nomically produced from aluminum at a signifi-cantly lower cost than comparable rolling stock in steel lightweight construction. This involves the use of easily extruded, relatively corrosion insensitive, and easily age-hardened aluminum alloys such as AlMgSi0.5 and AlMgSi0.7, with-out which the very demanding cross-sectional geometries of the large profiles could not be pro-duced. These extrusion alloys also provided sig-nificant freedom in the design of the cross sec-tion to match the strength needed in the component. Until now, this could not be achieved with moderate to difficult to extrude alloys used previously in the manufacture of rolling stock. Modern concepts were also devel-oped for the steel lightweight designs of rolling stock, but these could not significantly reduce the price advantage of the aluminum large pro-file technology [Aug 77, Wis 92]. The rolling stock produced from welded large profile tech-nology also offers weight advantages over those produced from the high-strength steels. Both these factors resulted in the extensive applica-tion of the aluminum lightweight construcapplica-tion incorporating the large profile technology in Eu-rope and the United States in the 1980s [Dav 79,

Ing 91]. Further development resulted in interest in the aluminum large profile technology for the multiunit railcars for the high-speed rail traffic.

In this period, the percentage of rolling stock produced using large aluminum alloy profile technology increased out of proportion. At the start of the 1970s, it was approximately 5% but has now increased to over 60% [Ing 91].

Whereas the French high-speed train TGV of the SNCF with its respectable power and proven ability over several years was manufactured in steel, the German Railway decided to build its 280 km/h (175 mph) high-speed trains InterCity Express 1 (ICE1) and InterCity Express 2 (ICE2), as well as the 330 km/h InterCity Express 3 (ICE3), and the 230 km/h InterCity Express T (ICET), basically using self-supporting welded large aluminum profile technology. The only ex-ception was the power cars of the trains ICE1 and ICE2, which were manufactured in steel to ensure that the driven four axles per power car could apply sufficient normal force onto the track to obtain the torque needed to achieve high acceleration and deceleration.

This, however, results in high track loading because each wheel truck of these power cars places a load of 40 metric tons onto the rails.

Throughout Europe, however, the track can only be loaded to a maximum of 34 metric tons per wheel truck. For this reason, the two high-speed trains ICE1 and ICE2 cannot use the inter-Eu-ropean rail network. This, however, changed with the introduction of the high-speed train ICE3, which in contrast to the power car train is designed as a multiunit train; i.e., the driven axles are spread along the entire train with every second axis being driven. These trains apply a load less than 34 metric tons weight on the track per wheel truck and are therefore suitable for participation as multisystem trains for the Inter-European traffic [Tas 93]. The InterCity Express T (ICET) is in certain ways a special design of the ICE3 fitted with tilting technology devel-oped in Italy. With this design, the multiunit train can travel around curved rails with high speed. Figure 2.13 shows an example of the ICE1 framed with a schematic diagram of the extruded profiles for the floor group, the longi-tudinal member of the floor group, and the con-necting edge wall profile of the left side of the passenger carriage. The joint aids visible on the section corners in Fig. 2.13 for the longitudinal joining of the extruded sections are of interest.

Finally, Fig. 2.14 describes the design of the passenger carriage with all the large profiles for

Fig. 2.13 High-speed ICE1 of the Deutsche Bahn AG framed by the large sections of the carriage cross section shown in Fig. 2.14.

Source: Alusuisse

the left half of the carriage. In addition, Fig. 2.15 shows a view of the design of the passenger car-riage of the high-speed trains ICE2 and ICE3.

Other European national railways, for exam-ple, Denmark, England, Italy, and Norway, as well as Spain and Sweden, have learned the value of the self-supporting aluminum large pro-file technology in welded designs for high-speed trains as well as intercity passenger carriages and intercity rail cars. This technology has, for example, been used for building the 250 km/h (155 mph) high-speed Advanced Passenger Train of British Rail and the 300 km/h (185 mph) ERT 500 of the Italien Ferrovie dello Stato (FS). The French TGV Duplex, a double decker, new high-speed train of the SNCF, will be man-ufactured using welded aluminum large profile technology to control the track loading.

Self-supporting large profile aluminum tech-nology is used not only for high-speed trains running on rails. The carriages of the track guided fast magnetic levitation Transrapid, with a maximum speed of 500 km/h (310 mph) are built using the self-supporting aluminum large profile technology in a bolted design [Mil 88].

The prototype is shown in Fig. 2.16. This assem-bly method is described in the section “Bus Manufacture” later in this chapter.

Naturally, thought has been given to reducing the wagon weight in rail freight transport with

the aim of reducing transport energy costs. For a long time, there has been increasingly rigorous competition with other methods of transport, cluding road transport. Initially, this involved in-creasing the load capacity of the freight wagon by using individual, usually movable, aluminum alloy components for the same wagon axle load.

Consideration was then given to significantly improving the handling of the construction ele-ments. Sliding roofs, folding roofs, as well as sliding doors and shutters, were manufactured from aluminum sheet and reinforced with ex-truded sections by the German railway, DB, as well as the Swiss Federal Railway, SBB. With time, complete wagon bodies also were built from aluminum alloys. The structure of these wagons consisted of roll formed 1.5 to 2.0 mm thick AlMg3 sheets reinforced with AlMgSi0.5 extruded sections, apart from the under frame and the vertical end wall columns, which were made in steel. In addition, the aluminum con-struction offers not only the advantage of weight reduction but is also maintenance friendly, i.e., in contrast to steel designs, no painting is needed because of the corrosion resistance of the alu-minum alloys used.

Tilting sidewalls on open goods wagons for specific transport applications are manufactured from AlMgSi0.5 and AlMgSi0.7 extruded pro-files, as shown in Fig. 2.17. These sidewalls can

Fig. 2.14 Passenger carrier design on the high-speed train ICE1 of the Deutsche Bahn AG with the large sections of the left carriage section. Source: Alusuisse

be highly loaded and do not require any surface protection because of the corrosion resistance of the aluminum alloys.

The focal point of European rail transport is mixed cargo transport where the loading space of a wagon is more important than the load-carrying capacity. Consequently, the application of aluminum alloys is usually limited to movable components as described previously. Bulk goods transport by rail has only a limited role in Eu-rope.

This differs in other countries, including Australia, Canada, South Africa, and the United States, with, for example, rich surface reserves of coal and minerals. The extraction site is usu-ally a long distance from the processing plant so that bulk goods have to be transported over

large distances. This process is usually carried out using rolling stock with the optimum load capacity. The optimum storage capacity of these wagons can be achieved by using self-support-ing welded aluminum large profile technology, which makes them particularly economical compared with wagon designs in steel. Figures 2.18 and 2.19 show an example of a coal silo wagon built with aluminum large profile tech-nology. The sidewalls as well as the chassis of this coal silo wagon consist mainly of large extruded profiles in the aluminum alloy AlMgSi0.7 with large format sheets of AlMg2.7Mn in the floor area. The assembly of the silo wagon involves the use of the same automatic welding systems that are used for personnel carriages.

Fig. 2.16 Prototype of the magnetic levitation Transrapid manufactured with bolted aluminium large profile technology using aluminium AlMgSi0.7 extruded sections. Source: Alusuisse

Fig. 2.15 (a) Carriage shell cross section ICE2 and (b) carriage shell cross section ICE3, self-supporting using welded large section technology. Source: ADtranz

Silo wagons of this design were designed and built by Alusuisse to U.S. standards. In spite of the high material costs of the aluminum silo wagons, their manufacturing cost per ton

pay-load is approximately 10% less than that of a steel wagon.

Road Vehicles. The development of auto-mobile manufacture including both cars and

Fig. 2.17 Tilting trailer walls of an open goods wagon finished in extruded hollow sections in the alloys AlMgSi0.5 and AlMgSi0.7.

Source: Alusuisse

Fig. 2.18 Coal silo wagon produced in welded self-supporting large extrusion technology to U.S. standard. Source: Alusuisse

freight vehicles has been associated with the use of aluminum alloys from the beginning. Alu-minum gearbox and motor housings were al-ready being reported in the latter years of the nineteenth century. In 1924, the Swabische Hu¨t-tenwerk developed a car with a self-supporting aluminum design. In 1937, BMW fitted the well-known two-seater sports car 328 with an alu-minum alloy body. In racing car manufacture, the well-known Silver Arrow manufacturer Auto Union, BMW, and Mercedes Benz used aluminum alloys to produce the lightest chassis possible. Toward the end of 1920s, the first buses with aluminum bodies were built, particu-larly in Switzerland (Fig. 2.20).

After World War II, this development in-creased rapidly. The use of aluminum alloys in road vehicles increased continuously. Today, af-ter steel, aluminum alloys are the most important material in the manufacture of automobiles. In 1993, in Germany alone 315,000 metric tons of aluminum were used in the manufacture of cars and 58,000 metric tons in freight vehicles [Gor 94]. The main applications of aluminum are castings for engine and gearbox housings, pis-tons, and cylinder heads, as well as car wheels.

It is also used as a semifinished product in the form of sheets or strip for the manufacture of bonnets and boot lids, water and oil coolers, and also sometimes for complete sports cars bodies

Fig. 2.19 Design and construction of the coal silo wagon shown in Fig. 2.18

Fig. 2.20 Older bus body manufactured from aluminum alloys in Switzerland with a frame in extruded sections. Source: Alusuisse

as well as extruded semifinished profiles for the production of trim and widow frames, and for safety components such as side-impact beams in car doors. Car superstructures and bus bodies, goods vehicle superstructures, and sidewalls, in addition to forgings for the manufacture of wheels and engine components, are also made from aluminum. This increasing use of alumi-num alloys provides these well-known advan-tages to the automobile industry:

● Lower vehicle mass and thus savings in mo-tive energy, i.e., fuel. According to [Her 90], the replacement of 200 kg of steel by 100 kg of aluminum in a car reduces the gasoline

consumption by about 0.6 to 0.8 l/km (in-creases mileage 3.5 to 4.7 mpg).

● Lower environmental pollution from exhaust gases as a result of the reduced fuel con-sumption.

● Reduction in maintenance costs due to the better corrosion resistance of the aluminum alloys

● Simple recycling of the aluminum alloys used as secondary aluminum

Passenger Cars. In 1958, Opel in Germany introduced the Rekord shown in Fig. 2.21 as a new design to the market. The car had as a new feature for the European automobile industry

Fig. 2.21 Automobile window frame in extruded, age-hard-ened, and anodized aluminum sections on an Opel Rekord manufactured in 1958. Source: Opel

Fig. 2.22 Rear window frame of the Mercedes W124 man-ufactured from extruded aluminum sections. The front windshield of the vehicle had a similar frame. Source: Erbs-lo¨h

window frames in extruded and age-hardened aluminum alloy for the front and rear wind-screens, as well as the side windows in the doors.

The aluminum frames were attached in such a way to the steel sheet that the top of the door consisted only of the window frames with the window glass, as shown in Fig. 2.21. The ex-truded profiles that formed the frames were de-signed in such a way that the rubber sections that sealed against the body could be easily located in the aluminum window frames. The extruded profiles were formed to the window frames on stretch bending machines, welded together, ground, and polished and anodized to a thick-ness of 4 to 6 lm. The section material used by Opel was initially Al99.8ZnMg and, later, Al99.8MgSi.

Opel introduced this design within Germany following pressure from the United States. The design was quickly adopted by Audi, BMW, and Ford. The aluminum alloy solution heat treated during the billet heating was extruded into water (standing wave). The sections had a weight per meter of only 0.150 to 0.850 kg. In the early

years, high demands were placed on the deco-rative appearance, in particular, on the optimum polish. Good mechanical properties were also required. The top of the door consisted only of an aluminum frame, and this frame should not bend when the door was closed. Aluminum ex-truded profile window frames appeared in many

years, high demands were placed on the deco-rative appearance, in particular, on the optimum polish. Good mechanical properties were also required. The top of the door consisted only of an aluminum frame, and this frame should not bend when the door was closed. Aluminum ex-truded profile window frames appeared in many