Trains and carriages operating in northern Sweden are often exposed to a harsh climate, something that means, among other things, that the vehicles’ wheel sets become worn and damaged – particularly at the start of winter.
EuroMaint Rail has been responsible for the maintenance of Swiss company AAE’s freight carriages from its workshop in Luleå for several years. AAE is Europe’s largest privately-owned company for rental of railway carriages and cooperates with Sweden’s SSAB, which with its so-called “Stålpendeln” transports around 2 million tons of steel each year between Luleå and Borlänge.
Over the past few years, cold winters have meant that EuroMaint Rail has been fully occupied working on wheel replacements on AAE’s vehicles as soon as the cold and snow has arrived. AAE’s vehicles are exposed to challenging conditions, as they are heavily axle-loaded, while the winter brings narrow embankments. This leads to material falling off the wheels, in the form of cavities, which in turn reduces the availability of the carriages.
With experience of work from the most recent winters, EuroMaint Rail, together with AAE, has agreed to work proactively on inspections and maintenance of all the carriages’ wheel sets.
“Historically, a large number of wheel sets have had to be replaced on our vehicles at the start of the winter. We believe that EuroMaint’s proposal to work preventively on planning wheel set replacements will mean greater availability of transport capacity and the transport of a higher volume of steel,” comments Jakob Oehrstoem, Business Development Manager at AAE.
The aim is to check the condition of the wheel treads and replace those wheels where initial damage is confirmed and for which the wheel damage detectors placed on the tracks have not yet raised the alarm. In total, the 300 carriages in the vehicle fleet will undergo an inspection in November or at the start of December.
“By working on this type of initiative, the customer gets better availability and reliability for their vehicles,” says Ulf Norberg, Account Manager at EuroMaint Rail.