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Versatile, Efficient and Longer Wagon for European Transportation

Periodic Report Summary - VEL-WAGON (Versatile, efficient and longer wagon for European transportation)

Project context and objectives:

The basic idea of VEL-WAGON project is that in the future, longer loading surfaces without interruptions, as well as more capable platforms with higher axle loads and with lower loading heights will be necessary to increase the capacity of the freight railway transportation. This can be understood as a follow-up to the current trend of enlarging the vehicles of other means of transportation like the Giga-liners trucks or the container vessels. As a European Commission (EC)-financed research project VEL-WAGON will pursue strongly the knowledge expansion in the following subjects:

1. Future rail-road intermodal transportation market in Europe, especially when it comes to the utilisation of Intermodal transport units (ITU) and freight wagons.
2. Future wagonload transportation market in Europe, especially when it comes to conventional wagonloads and freight wagons utilisation.
3. Infrastructure limitations, technical and economical, to extended wagon lengths, axle loads and loading gauges. In that context identify and assess infrastructure capacity enlargements, implications of axle load increases, study suitable corridors and areas of influence of VEL-WAGON.
4. Wagon enlargement possibilities, especially when it comes to length between bogie pivots, length between pivots and couplers, loading height and loading gauge for ITUs (also semitrailers) and conventional units, tare weight, heavy stresses on frame as well as dynamic and static properties of such wagons.
5. Economic equilibrium between wagon capacity increase, infrastructure requirements and freight market.

Project results:

The work performed during the first 12 months of the project has achieved important objectives, namely:

To point 1: Future rail-road intermodal transportation market in Europe, especially when it comes to the utilisation of ITU and freight wagons

A description and analysis of the intermodal traffic in Europe has taken place obtaining the following conclusions:

- the intermodal traffic should be divided in two main segments, hinterland and continental transport;
- hinterland transport is participated by ISO-containers, mainly 40 ft (60 %) and 20 ft (40 %), 45 ft containers have a small share and are employed in Northern Europe and short sea shipping principally;
- the proportion of 40 ft containers is growing, especially the hi-cube type, in 2020 (if trend continues) almost 70 % of the containers will be 40 ft hi-cubes;
- today the average gross weight of a loaded Twenty-foot equivalent unit (TEU) is 12.8 t (empty + loaded, 11 t). By 2020 the TEU weight is not expected to change very much or it may decrease somewhat;
- goods transported in containers can be classified in four groups: light goods (approximately 6 t / TEU, 43 %), medium light goods 14 t / TEU (approximately 14 t / TEU, 30 %), heavy goods (approximately 23 t / TEU, 19 %) and very heavy goods (approximately 30 t / TEU, 8 %), see exhibit.

The optimal wagon length for such combination of units is 80 ft according to performed calculations in VEL-WAGON. Hence, a popular wagon nowadays is the 6-axle 80 ft wagon; however, this wagon may be over-dimensioned in terms of deadweight and axles for many transport cases.
- The VEL-WAGON proposes a lighter 4-axle 80 ft container wagon that targets the lighter cases; first estimations indicate an increase of 10 % of TEU capacity in respect to a reference case.
- Continental transport is uses mainly semitrailers, swap bodies and tank, bulk and silo containers.
- The semitrailer segment has experienced an important growth during these last years. The average gross weight of a loaded semitrailer is 27 t. Apparently, this weight is decreasing as semitrailers carry more and more volumetric goods.
- 45 ft swap bodies and containers are quite common and are growing in share.
- Short tanks, silos and short swap bodies represent the majority of transported units.
- The light goods in continental transportation tend to travel longer distances than the heavy goods. Hence, it is expected to see a decrease of the average TEU weight for continental intermodal trains accompanying the trend of longer transported distances.
- The rolling stock employed for continental transportation is quite varied. The 60 ft long wagons dominate but above 104 ft articulated wagon with two pockets for are increasing.

The performance of a VEL-WAGON with 80 ft length has been simulated under typical traffic conditions, an approximate 10 % increase of TEU capacity is attained against a reference case.

The optimal traffic for the VEL-WAGON is the one with great assorted types of units, like the main stream shuttle trains. In this case the extra length of VEL-WAGON offers greater loading case possibilities.

It has been decided to prioritise the container and swap body segment, this is, in principle not to target semitrailer traffic, in this way VEL-WAGON 80 ft may not have a pocket. The reason is strategic and economic as the costs for technical development of VEL-WAGON can be reduced and there are already very efficient rolling stock addressing such market. Cost should be judged in relation to the benefit, quantitatively. A popular wagon nowadays is the 6-axle twin-trailer wagon; however this wagon may be over-dimensioned in terms of deadweight and axles for many transport cases.

In continental and hinterland transport, a non-articulated container-only 80 ft wagon would, compared to the most common or to the best designs used today:

- increase the loading factor (number of TEUs per train) by 10 % ;
- decrease the number of axles by 15 % ;
- decrease the gross train weight by 7 % ;
- improve aerodynamics (fewer and shorter gaps);
- decrease noise emissions (fewer axles);
- decrease maintenance (fewer axles).

To point 2: Future wagonload transportation market in Europe, especially when it comes to conventional wagonloads and freight wagons utilisation

The use of conventional wagons involves both individual wagonloads and unit trains, as well as in some cases hybrids between these. Unit trains are used to minimise the shipping cost for large concentrated flows, in many cases between different production units or in some cases involving seaports. Successful examples include raw materials and semi-finished goods such as ore, metals, coal, petroleum, forest products and automobiles. For this segment high productivity and low cost are priorities, which are achieved step-by-step by increasing the governing engineering standards for both trains and wagons, such as train length and mass, loading gauge, meter load and axle load. Where the transported freight flows are large, unit trains are very competitive against other transport modes, and will continue to develop further. Current limitations in northern Europe are 8 200 ton trains for iron ore and 4 000 tons for other commodities, with lengths of up to 925 m.

Single wagonload, in contrast, competing with highway-and-rail intermodal transportation, as well as with direct highway transportation, is generally declining in Europe, although a reversal can also be seen in some cases. The decline is manifested in fewer shipments being sent as wagonload, but also in a falling availability of the facilities needed for wagonload handling, such as sidings and publicly accessible loading areas at local stations. Several nations have abandoned single wagonload service. Key factors for wagonload to be able to sustain or even improve its competitiveness are accessibility and transit times as well as cost. Cost can be cut by raising the capacity of the individual wagon through larger loading gauges and higher axle loads. A particular segment where single wagonload can be competitive is the transportation of those items whose dimensions or mass exceed the normal limits on the highway, such as long pipes, plate, poles, masts, beams, house sections and heavy machinery, but this depends on loading and unloading facilities being available at both the origin and the destination. Current limitations in northern Europe are up to (approximately) 13 m2 loading gauge rectangular cross section above floor level (1.2 m ATOR), 5.3 m high intermodal gauge at 2.6 m width (P/C 497), 25.1 m loading length, and for iron ore 12 tons / m and 30 tons axle load, while the current design standards for new bridges in northern Sweden are for 14 tons / m and 40 tons axle load.

A recent trend is coordinated transports from nearby production plants over long distances to the market. This may consolidate products from even competing producers to gain the economy of scale of unit trains, and bypass the traditional marshalling yards to achieve short transit times and high equipment and staff utilisation, but near the end of the flow disperse to many individually small consignees. It thus has characteristics of both unit train and single wagonload handling, and competes on cost and transit time as well as service frequency and reliability. The competitiveness can be enhanced if backhauls can be found for a large share of the wagons. This is a growing pattern with potential to grow further. With continued internationalisation in trade patterns follows longer transport distances, resulting in a larger share of shipments taking longer than over-night, thus an increasing share of freight trains travelling also during daytime, for which high travel speeds are required to travel interspaced between faster passenger trains on the same track. In summary, some trends that are likely to be continued further, and that will help shape the competitiveness of the unit train and wagonload transportation segments (and to some extent intermodal):
- bigger trains and wagons;
- higher speeds;
- simpler handling, one-man switch crews, possibly automated brake tests;
- information sharing and responsiveness to shifting shipment demands;
- terminal availability, cheap multi-use terminals.

To point 3: Infrastructure limitations, technical and economic, to extended wagon lengths, axle loads and loading gauges

In that context identify and assess infrastructure capacity enlargements, implications of axle load increases, study suitable corridors and areas of influence of VEL-WAGON. The main conclusive points are:

VEL-WAGON 80 ft needs a longer distance between pivots, c.a. 18 m, which increases the overthrow of some parts of the wagon when running sharp curves. This implies a loss of loading gauge, which in smaller gauges requires a lower loading height for the containers. In the infrastructures having a larger-than-GB loading gauge this seems not to be a problem even with standard loading gauges of 1175 mm. Hence in Germany, Austria, Poland, Hungary, North of Italy, Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Sweden and Norway where the codes P400 and higher are available a VEL-WAGON with standard height would be able to transport almost all kind of road-compatible containers and swap bodies.

A rough calculation of the necessary loading height has been done, obtaining that an ISO hi-cube (2 896 x 2 438) could be transported on a number of important lines in Europe (GB gauge) if a low loading height of approximately 1 040 mm is achieved. Such loading height is quite low for being achieved with wheels of diameter 920 mm. Apparently, one of the problems is the reduced space for the draw gear, which necessitates a new technical development for this element.

The use of 920 mm diameter wheels is important for guaranteeing a satisfactory payload capacity of the wagon with 22.5 t per axle and to enable standard maintenance for freight wagons.

VEL-WAGON 80 ft should also be able to offer lower loading heights, e.g. 600 mm loading height between the bogies for transporting high units, e.g. Megaboxes in GB gauges, or to be able to transport hi-cubes in the smallest loading gauges e.g. GA or G1. Hence VEL-WAGON would have a second loading level between the bogies that although it means a loss on effective loading surface, it may still be competitive with the low floor wagons existing on the market.

Geometrically, the VEL-WAGON with hi-cube load units fits inside an intermodal code of C364 (Spain, France and Italy) having no special problems with greater codes. For smaller loading gauges, a second low level floor is foreseen between the bogies. The VEL-WAGON will normally have higher axle loads than shorter wagons because of having fewer axles per meter. A first estimation indicates that the increase of tonnage per axle should be around 20 % both in hinterland and in continental traffic. This estimation has been achieved together with the calculations on hinterland and continental traffic, a summary including the average axle loads for each case is presented as follows.

Energy demand

VEL-WAGON project calculated as well resistance forces of different freight train runs in combined traffic and compared their energy demand.

The calculations gave the result that 17 % of the demanded energy can be saved when using VEL-WAGONs.

When analysing which resistance forces were reduced, rolling resistance was very important (44 % of the energy saves). Rolling resistance, which is composed of the resistances of wheels, bearings, springs and dampers, decreases, when total weight is low and few axles are used (therefore axle load gets higher). A VEL train is lighter and through its high load factor and fewer bogies, rolling resistance falls significantly compared to shorter wagons. Furthermore, when applying VEL-WAGONs, aerodynamic resistance decreases by 14 %. The reason for this is that due to the long loading surface the load factor is very high and therefore fewer gaps on a wagon will occur.

Grade resistance can be reduced too, as VEL-Train has less dead weight per TEU. Curve and acceleration resistance are very small and therefore negligible.

In a last step various assumptions has been taken, namely: level track, hilly track, highly loaded infrastructure and 80 ft articulated as reference wagon. Savings through the VEL-WAGON application stayed approximately at the same range (-17 %) for the different variations, only the comparison against 80 ft articulated wagon gave different results, ca. 7 % energy savings of VEL-WAGON against an 80 ft articulated wagon.

Thus, VEL-WAGON offers important energy savings as it enables better arrangement of containers that make better use of loading surface of trains, furthermore it utilises fewer axles and less deadweight for same or even more transport output.

To point 4: Wagon enlargement possibilities, especially when it comes to length between bogie pivots, length between pivots and couplers, loading height and loading gauge for ITUs (also semitrailers) and conventional units, tare weight, heavy solicitations on frame as well as dynamic and static properties of such wagons

The main points are dedicated to the technical development and are classified as confidential by the developer, nevertheless the important design parameters of the wagon are listed as follows:

- loading length 80 ft;
- pivot distance approximately 18 m;
- loading height:
- level 1: 1040 mm;
- level 2: 600 mm (between bogies);
- axle load 22.5 t;
- max speed 120 km / h loaded or empty;
- tare 22 t.

To point 5: Economic equilibrium between wagon capacity increase, infrastructure requirements and freight market

This point will be addressed in the upcoming Work package three (WP3).

Potential impact:

VEL-WAGON has as well other potential impacts that will be attained as the project advances during the second period, mainly:

Influence on the standardisation processes occurring in intermodal systems, rolling stock and infrastructures.

Being VEL-WAGON longer than the standard wagons for intermodal transports, it has important effects on the loading gauge. The coding of wagons is influenced by the distance between the bogie pivots and the loading height of the wagon. The capability of the wagon to transport containers is also coded, in this way it is possible to know which container fits with which wagon and within which loading gauge.

VEL-WAGON intends to present its results and new standards to the persons that may be involved in the periodic review of the norms related to coding. By this it is possible to include open points that enable a future preparation of the normative for more capable, more efficient and more sustainable rolling stock.

Pave the way for an actual implementation and use of a VEL-WAGON concept. The upcoming activities related to business appraisal of VEL-WAGON together with the progresses on homologation, as well as on the technical developments will pave the way for convincing a transport company (intermodal company, logistics operator, wagon leasing company) to take part in a trial project where the actual benefits of this technology can be achieved on the rails.

Project website: http://www.VEL-WAGON.eu