Vivarail 'Acti-Wheel' steering system

[MarkyT]

I'm very interested in this technology and can see it could be a great help in reducing the costs of wear and tear on rural railways and street tramways. A promising market might be the various 'ultra light rail' initiatives being pursued currently. The potential for avoiding heavy bogies on lightweight vehicles is laudable but a concern as far as ride quality is concerned (as I and others raised earlier in this now merged thread) particularly on old jointed track that ActiWheel's avoidance of wear might be able to life-extend. One possible way of alleviating this could be a complementary active suspension system that can quickly counter the fast vertical accelerations that lead to the pacer's 'nodding donkey' riding characteristics. Thus I repeat my suggestion to acquire a redundant pacer unit for a trial of bogieless operation with the addition of an active suspension system to further improve ride quality.

 

[RMU]

Replacing bogies with a pair of steering ActiWheels is certainly an option for reducing vehicle mass, even though the ‘axle’ would have to yaw more than in a bogie solution. If the finance could be found, then SET would certainly consider partaking in such a demonstration.

 

[squizzler]

What an interesting thought.

Isambard wanted to increase the gauge by ~50%. Other things being equal, this would have increased the speed that suspensions became unstable and the Edwardians could have enjoyed rail speeds over 100mph without fear - provided the propulsion and braking technology could cope. However, for curves, the disparity between inner and outer rail would be 50% greater and thus longitudinal forces would be greater. Does this mean that Edwardians would be plagued with RCF?

I was simply wondering if the engineers were frustrated by the track gauge, and what they would choose if they were starting from scratch. My reasoning is that in motorcars and such where the wheels rotate independently, they tend to position them as wide as the vehicle envelope allows, and wondered if your engineers would have liked to have done the same thing if it was possible to do so. But if actiwheel is envisioned for passenger vehicles only, an ideal gauge would still need to be a compromise as to allow traditional conical wheels to steer within reasonable curve radii.

So, I’m sitting on the fence. What enabled our technology was the availability to control high power switching devices. I’m not sure how a steam powered version would have been controlled.

I should point out that this comes from one of our technical people -RMU

LOL. Although talking of application of your technology to steam railways of deviant gauges, would it be possible to make a Segway scooter that runs on narrow gauge lines? Such a contraption would make a perfect track inspection vehicle for 2' lines such as the Vale of Rheidol, Ffestiniog and the rest!

As for wheel arrangement classification, if the UIC wheel arrangement uses an 'o' to denote an individually motored axle, should some other letter be used if the wheels are individually motored? Or should it be 'double o' (already a familiar designation elsewhere in railways), so an updated 2 car pacer might be Boo+Boo

 

[talerddig]

Certainly from the perspective of the VOR, the Permaquip fits the bill. A mobile hut on wheels, providing mobility, access and storage, which is what the P-way team need, I would think.

 

[squizzler]

More in-depth article on International Rail Journal:

British group develops autonomous wheel control system
SET, Britain, together with Vivarail and Loughborough and Huddersfield universities, have developed an autonomous wheel control system called Acti-Wheel which they believe could revolutionise wheelset design. Neil Cooney from SET explains the background to the project and the progress so far.

This includes an intriguing passage where it is suggested that the train will be able to steer itself.

"...It is also a stepping stone on the route to operational automation where vehicles could guide themselves through switches and allow peer-to-peer communications so the restrictive signalling system could be removed. But that is way further down the line.”