In Western Europe, most operators prefer new instead of refurbished vehicles. This is the conclusion of a market overview in the last 10 to 15 years. Private, western operators have begun their activity 15 years ago, based on old, modernised vehicles, but currently, almost all successful operators in Western Europe use new vehicles, because this is the only way in which they can face the competition of state-operators. Most of the state-owned railway companies in Western Europe have modernised their fleet of vehicles in the past 20 years.
“ In order to have a good maintenance plan, not only in terms of availability and reliability but also in economic terms, it is very important to keep the fleet of locomotives as upgraded as possible. Having new or updated equipments and components will make possible the utilisation of the most recent maintenance technical solutions and will have a direct impact in the efficiency of the maintenance procedures, apart of the obvious improvement of the locomotive technical performance”, says Aitor Llorente, Regional Manager of CAF Spanish manufacturer.
After an accurate technical study, upgrading of necessary equipments will imply not only the saving of labour and associated costs during maintenance process, i.e. the improvement of Life Cycle Cost but the achievable of the technical level of reliability of recent equipments, added the CAF representatives.
On the other hand, GE Transportation believes strongly in the process of taking older diesel electric locomotives and giving them “a new lease on life”. GE Transportation has carried out over 1100 modernisations globally, most of which in Russia, Kazakhstan, Poland, Mongolia and Syria. “We believe that modernized locomotives should have a new life expectancy of 15 to 20 years, give appreciable benefits in lower fuel and lubricating oil consumption, possibly provide higher power and or tractive effort, benefit from modern microprocessor controls for improved performance and reliability”, declared Krikor Aghajanian, Manager European Sales and Modernisation of Locomotives, GE Transportation.
“As base rule, we believe that, apart from the operation benefits, the cost of a modernised locomotive should be around 50 – 60% from the acquisition price of a new locomotive”, Krikor Aghajanian, manager on Europe for locomotive sales and modernisation, GE Transportation.
“We had to stop modernising locomotives in the EU countries in December 2010. This was driven by the emissions regulations applicable, and GE not having a suitable engine that met the current EU3A emissions compliant engine that could be applied to the old locomotives. This basically means that the unmodernised locomotives will continue operating within the UE with their old engines that consume more fuel and oil, and are unreliable, rather than being modernised and operating with an engine that does not quite meet current emissions. With fuel being the biggest spend in the operation of a diesel electric locomotive, getting lower fuel consumption would result in lower emissions”
by Elena Ilie
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