The vital quality pentagram of rail production

Cooling bed

ultra-long: 120 metres - the longest weldfree rails in the world

Longer rails mean less welding. This keeps costs down and also minimises risk from defects. We developed our uniquely long 120m rails for our customers and are pleased to see them growing in popularity.

Straightening machine

ultra-precise: geometrically exact - physically and chemically perfect

voestalpine Schienen GmbH make rails. Not girders or any other steel products - just rails. Our new rail rolling mill is therefore euqipped solely for rail production, which enables us to furhter minimise tolerances. This means our customers benefit from outstanding dimensional consistency and smoothness of the rail surface, along with the purity of the steel and absence of tension within the rails. 

Head hardened rail products

ultra-durable:  HSH^®- the solution for high-performance railway tracks

Harder, stronger and lasting much longer. We are the only company worldwide that produces ultra-long rails up to 120 m with a hardened rail head featuring a homogeneous fine-pearlitic microstructure. This means our rails are extremly wear-resistant and have a significantly improved resistance against rolling contact fatigue (prevention of head checks) - a defect that is currently causing enormous problems in railway networks.

voestalpine Schienen GmbH offers a comprehensive range of head-hardened rail products, so that a suitable rail type is available for any application. We are also the only manufacturer in the world that supplies head-hardened grooved rails for tramways (available in the ultra-hard "fit-and-forget" quality and also in grades suitable for deposit welding).

Railputler

ultra-flexible:  In both word and deed the customer is king

Not only does voestalpine Schienen GmbH make state of the art rails, we combine this with excellent customer service (logistics, system support, railrelated services). We offer just-in-time deliveries to construction sites - including, if needed, unloading of the ultra-long rails with our Railputler^® custom machines designed solely for this purpose.

We have two 24 hour fully automated stock-yards for our ultra-long rails. These are operated round the clock and have become the benchmarks on which our competitors are measured. Now with the new UFR rolling mill, we are in a position to produce small lot sizes just in time, responding even more flexibly to the wishes of our customers.

Life cycle costs

ultra-economical:  Lowest LCC for highest customer benefit

The life-cycle cost philosophy of voestalpine Schienen GmbH focuses on the core benefits to our rail customers.

• Cost - effective initial and replacement investments (taking into account all aspects of the product, logistics and installation)
• Longest possible cost-effective service life (optimised lifespan and maintenance strategies based on RAMS criteria: Reliability, Availability, Maintainability, Safety)
• Removal and recycling (fast, cost-effective and with minimum disruption)

Every project ist implemented in close cooperation with our customers based on their specific requirements. For this purpose, we have specially devised LCC software tools for both railway and urban transport projects.

voestalpine Schienen GmbH is a leading company in the field of LCC in Europe, and is a consortium partner in the LCC project  INNOTRACK for rail tracks, which has already been pre-qualified by the EU and will be implemented form autumn 2006.