Intercity train for the Chinese capital Beijing

The Chinese government is relying on public transport with rail vehicles for the mobility of the growing middle class within and between the country's metropolitan areas. The development of the railroad industry is a high priority, and expertise in the development of vehicles has quickly become a world leader in recent decades.

In contrast to metro and high-speed transport, there are still few vehicles developed in the country for connecting the suburbs to the city center. The Beijing-based rail vehicle and system supplier RTTE (Beijing Rail Transit Technology and Equipment Group Co., Ltd.), a subsidiary of the world's largest metro company, therefore commissioned HÖRMANN Vehicle Engineering to develop a new type of 8-car vehicle with a length of 187 meters for connecting smaller towns in the suburbs to the center of Beijing. The innovative vehicle is designed to handle the flow of commuters into the city center and make the surrounding towns accessible for a leisure trip.

HÖRMANN Vehicle Engineering developed the entire vehicle. A large part of this consisted of the mechanical design of the body shell with complete strength calculations for the aluminum car body, the interior and the driver's cab as well as the bogie integration. The company was also responsible for the design of the electrical system architecture with integration of all systems, including traction equipment, lighting, brakes, air conditioning, passenger information and safety systems. Finally, the circuit diagram was drawn up. The system development was accompanied by a safety-oriented process in accordance with EN 50126, taking into account the specifications for RAM (Reliability Availability, Maintainability). Close and cooperative collaboration with the RTTE development team contributed significantly to the success of the project throughout its entire duration from the beginning of 2018 to summer 2019. The service also included subsequent support during the construction phase of the first vehicle by the engineers from Chemnitz at the manufacturer's site.

The innovative dual-system vehicle can be operated both with direct current in the inner-city rail network and with alternating current in the national network. "One of the challenges that we successfully solved was meeting the requirements of the very different systems," says Managing Director Frank Salzwedel.

HÖRMANN Vehicle Engineering also fully complied with the maximum axle load, despite the additional system components, and with the spatial restrictions imposed by operation in subway railroad tunnels.