New FRA equipment regulations published

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CHamilton

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The new rules are similar to the relevant Euronorm. There are still small changes to the seats, glazing, and emergency lighting, but not to the structure of the equipment. This means that unmodified European products will remain illegal on American tracks, unlike the situation in Canada, where the O-Train runs unmodified German trains using strict time separation from freight. However, trains manufactured for the needs of the American market using the same construction techniques already employed at the factories in France, Germany, Switzerland, and Sweden should not be a problem.
https://pedestrianobservations.com/2018/11/20/fra-reform-is-here/
 
One wonders whether the stillborn N-S bilevels would have met the revised standards...

Anyway, this is great news that *should* make new intercity and commuter/regional rail purchases somewhat less expensive and perhaps make production quicker. (Of course, if rail agencies insist on status quo North American-style tanks [gallery cars for Metra, as an example], well, never mind.)
 
Maybe I'm misreading the revisions, but it looks like there are alternative standards that can be substituted for the 800,000lb buff strength requirement.

The 800,000lb requirement is in § 238.203(a)(1). Newly-revised § 238.201(b)(2)(i) states that "Tier I passenger trainsets may comply with the alternative crashworthiness and occupant protection requirements in appendix G to this part instead of the requirements in § 238.203..." Appendix G refers back to another section, requiring that rail cars "shall resist a minimum quasi-static end load applied on the collision load path of...800,000 pounds without permanent deformation of the occupied volume." Compare that to the buff strength requirements which state that rail cars "shall resist a minimum static end load of 800,000 pounds applied on the line of draft without permanent deformation of the body structure"

Perhaps someone can clarify but it looks like the new/alternate standards are based on crumple zones that protect the occupied portion of the rail car, instead of prohibiting any structural deformation.
 
Your interpretation is correct. Crumple zone based designs are now allowed but the static load requirement remains 800k. The passenger compartment must not deform, but the structure outside it is allowed to deform unlike in the past when the entire car was not allowed to deform. Unfortunately the NS design sort of deformed in an arbitrary way. In any case it was not a proper crumple zone design either.
 
Ah.  So under the new standards, it would have been OK to have the end vestibules crumple... but that's not how the NS vehicles failed. 

They probably could have designed vehicles which worked given this set of regulations, though.  :p
 
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