Welding adding spark

	Holland's Mobile Welders equipped with satellite communications and hand-held computers to enable remote diagnostics and improved uptime of the equipment.

	Chemetron, the welding division of Progress Rail Services, continues to add in-track capacity to meet demand.

	Orgo-Thermit now has several Head Repair Welds (top", middle and bottom) for evaluation in revenue service.

	Railtech Boutet is improving its Head Wash Repair Welding system.

Applied Ultrasonics

Applied Ultrasonics’ UIT, which uses ultrasonic energy to improve the fatigue performance of a range of metals, recently treated switch points for a railroad in southern Mississippi to increase their fatigue life and hardness. Riding in a hi-rail vehicle, expert technicians traveled down the line treating each switch point up to around seven feet from the edge using Ultrasonic Impact Treatment. UIT was applied to 17 switch points over the course of two days without interrupting the ongoing train schedule. Mississippi Export Railroad has expressed interest in having Applied Ultrasonics come back to address further points on another line.

Mark Miller of Mississippi Export Railroad said: “Our preliminary results have indicated our use of UIT has improved our switch point life and decreased wear in some of our high wear point areas”

Chemetron

“Chemetron, the welding division of Progress Rail Services, continues to add capacity to meet the growing demand for electric flash butt welding,” said Mark McLean, manager sales. “Not only have we added more welded rail trains and unloaders, we have also increased our contract service fleet of in-track welders. Chemetron introduced the first 180-ton DC-powered closure welder in 2007. Since then, we have put over a dozen new units to work. Customers like the improved productivity and reliability of this system, compared to the conventional welder with separate puller. We have a number of additional units under construction and will continue to add in-track capacity to meet customer demand.

“Chemetron has been fortunate to participate in several major transit and contractor welding projects,” McLean said. “Several of these projects included rail, plant welding and delivery of cwr, as well as in-track welding of the strings to complete the project. Our ability to provide a full continuously welded rail package is a unique benefit we can provide our customers.”

He addd: “We expect to see continued growth in the rail welding business sector. We are also seeing very strong international interest in our services and equipment.”

Holland L.P.

“We have been continuing to expand the applications for the Holland Low Consumption Weld we introduced a few years back,” said Kevin Flaherty, general manager-sales for Holland L.P. “With the revisions in the AREMA specifications in 2009, the LCW now officially meets the revised standard. The LCW reduces the amount a labor necessary in Joint Elimination Repair Welding and increases productivity.

“For the 2009 season, Holland has once again increased its mobile welding capacity by 15 percent,” Flaherty noted. “We added an additional 10 Mobile Welders to our fleet. We have also equipped all our Mobile Welders with hand-held computers that provide a quicker, more accurate means of recording and reporting daily production and weld records. The Mobile Welders equipped with satellite communications and hand-held computers enable remote diagnostics and improved uptime of the equipment.

“In a difficult economic climate, we have seen the demand for our welding services continue to grow,” he said. “As stated earlier, we increased capacity by 15 percent in 2009 and are still experiencing times without available capacity. It has been comforting that the demand has been broad-based from many customers, including most of the Class 1 railroads, contractors and transits.

“Holland continues to be a basic manufacturer of our welding equipment,” Flaherty pointed out. “We continually review and revise designs to improve product performance, productivity and reliability. We strive to lead the flash butt welding technology so we can continue to offer a superior product with lower overall costs to the railroads.”

Flaherty said: “In the long run we feel the market for Holland’s Flash Butt Welding is very positive. Most railroads are maintaining a focus on joint elimination in ongoing maintenance programs. As the traffic levels rebound to pre-recession levels, we expect to see increased demand as heavier tonnage deteriorates the rail faster and creates more joints to be removed. Additionally, we are progressing with technology that can further reduce the installed costs of Holland’s welds. We intend to continue to provide the best value option for our customers’ welding requirements.”

Orgo-Thermit

“Orgo-Thermit offers the world’s most-comprehensive range of Thermit® welding kits, welding processes and crucibles,” said Dave Randolph, president. “We are the only Thermit welding manufacturer with various selections of mold applications. Our product line includes one- inch-gap molds for both two-piece and three-piece configurations, along with our Full Head Repair weld, our 1.5-inch Gap weld and our 2.75-inch Wide Gap weld.

“We offer three styles of crucibles: our Bucket-style Single-Use crucible, our Degradable- style Single-Use crucible and our reusable Monolith crucible,” Randolph said. We also carry a full line of domestic and European weld kits, tools and accessories for crane rail applications. With our various product lines our customers have many choices.

“We now have several Head Repair Welds for evaluation in revenue service,” Randolph said. “Interest is rapidly growing in other market segments.”

Orgo-Thermit is currently developing a molten steel containment device. This item is a safety feature for customers welding in frozen ballast/ice conditions.

Orgo-Thermit recently sold 10 Fume Extractors to an East Coast transit. This product is designed for welding inside tunnels, as well as environmentally-controlled welding projects.

“Our Thermit welds are being installed on many current projects. including shortlines, transits, Class 1s and crane rails,” Randolph noted. “We continue to see growth even though the overall utilization of rails is down.

“We are proud of our comprehensive Thermit welding training program. Our training course has proven to be an efficient and effective method of teaching proper weld installation procedures for installing our welding processes. Many of our customers invest in the refresher course annually and take advantage of our Train the Trainer program.

“We continue to produce at our primary manufacturing facility located in Manchester, N.J., and other global locations. We are ISO 9001:2000 certified along with certification M-1003, the Association of American Railroads Quality Assurance Program,” he said.

“Since the railroad industry as a whole is focusing into year 2035, we see a promising future for our company’s products,” Randolph noted. “Our passion for this industry, our wide product line, our continued research and development capabilities contributing to an efficient means of joining steel rail together and the collaboration of our team, we look at the future with a positive attitude.”

Railtech Boutet

“At Railtech Boutet, we are continuing to work and improve our Head Wash Repair Welding system,” said Oliver Dolder, vice president – business operations. “After a successful first round of installations and results at TTCI, we are currently making additional installations in order to expand the usage of this weld to repair defective plant welds and defective flash-butt welds. This is in addition to repairing transverse and corner gauge defects. The simplicity of the welding system, as well as the shorter installation time needed, will provides our customers an additional easy and inexpensive option to make repairs in track.

“We are in the final stages of starting our one-shot crucible production in Napoleon, Ohio. We are set to start producing commercially in September. We’ve received a lot of support from both our local and state governments for this project as it is going to create additional jobs in a part of the country that has been deeply affected by the decline of the car industry and the large number of layoffs it caused.”

He continued: “We are continuing our study on high-carbon and high-strength rail and are designing a weld kit that is closer to the metallurgical properties of these types of special rails to accommodate our customers who are currently using these types of rails in main line track and/ or tangents and curves. We plan to make field tests at TTCI later this year.”