As a result of new legislation, Dutch railway companies were faced with more stringent rules for the refurbishment of trains. IGB assisted one of these companies in managing and documenting their repair activities and maximized efficiency in repair approval procedures.
In 2005 new a railways act became effective in Holland. One of the new regulations prescribes that an information file shall be compiled with every structural repair on the train’s underframe or bodyshell. This file is to be approved by one of the five notified bodies appointed by the Dutch Authorities.
IGB was assigned to assist a company specialized in Locomotive maintenance and overhaul to meet the new requirements by setting up the complete collision repair process.
In cooperating with the customer, a complete set of procedures is compiled in order to manage the repair process in a controllable and efficient manner. To achieve this several meeting with notified bodies were arranged and damages previously occurred were analyzed. After review, the procedures were incorporated in the customer’s ERP- system*, making it accessible for all employees.
In addition to this, IGB assisted during actual repairs with project management and improving damage assessment methods. Furthermore the Finite Element Method was applied in order to visualize deformations of the locomotive’s underframe. The Finite Element Method was also applied in order to determine if underframe lay-up methods are acceptable.
The customer now possesses a flexible, universal 100% traceable working method for the repair of structural damage to locomotives.
*ERP: Enterprise Resource Planning; the automated registration of logistic, administrative and financial business processes within one company-wide information management application.