I just wanted to share a few thoughts with you about my trip last month to Berlin to visit Innotrans. (Scroll down for video links.)
The City of Berlin
Berlin is a fascinating city with a tremendous amount of history. It was the capital of the Prussian Empire before World War 1, and then the capital of Nazi Germany. After World War 2, during the Cold War, it was the only outpost of West Germany in the middle of East Germany. Finally, it became the capital of a reunified Germany after the collapse of the Berlin Wall. All this history makes it well worth a visit on its own.
Innotrans
And what is Innotrans? It’s the largest railway tradeshow in the world. This year, according to the post show reporting, the show had over 2900 exhibitors and 170,000 attendees from all over the world. With over 30 halls full of vendors, plus extensive outdoor exhibits, this dwarfs any other rail show I’ve ever been to. It’s astonishing. The show organizers have arranged that public transit in the city is free for attendees. There are thousands of people on the trains and often it’s standing room only. And the halls can sometimes feel the same way. Innotrans is definitely something to add to your bucket list if you’re a railroader!
The focus of this year’s show was sustainability, and you could see that theme everywhere. As noted here, all the major rail manufacturers were highlighting their efforts to increase sustainability. Also, many smaller exhibitors were featuring products that could be used to make railroading more sustainable.
Helping BSB Maschinenbau GmbH
I was at Innotrans primarily to help at the booth for BSB Maschinenbau, the manufacturer of the tinbin TC2 vacuum excavator attachment. There are many customers visiting the booth to see the demonstrations. Many of them speak English better than they speak German, so it’s handy to have someone who can speak English to help with these visitors. I’m happy to help out. (Although it’s not because I’m impressed with myself, because most of the employees speak two or more languages well, just not English).
Thousands of people stopped to see the tinbin TC2 in action. We would often have 75-100 people around the booth, mostly attracted by the noise and curious what the equipment was capable of doing. Here’s a video of a full demo on the first morning, when it was relatively quiet.
Customers also came to see the other attachments that BSB manufacturers, including ballast tampers, plows, and tie handlers.
Visiting BSB Headquarters
In addition, we also had an opportunity to take some of our contacts to visit the manufacturing facilities of BSB Maschinenbau GmbH in east Berlin.
BSB is currently producing about 100 tinbin TC2 units per year for all markets. Most of these units are sold in Europe, with about 25% going overseas to North America, Asia, and Australia / New Zealand. They also run a railroad maintenance company from the same shop.
Seeing the tinbin TC2 working with a LMSRA Ballast Screener
As part of this tour, we were also able to see the tinbin TC2 working in conjunction with a ballast screener, the KS2340 LMRSA. This was a special treat. I’ve been aware of this ballast screener for several years, but this was the first time I’ve seen the LMSRA in action. You can see a video here.
In this demo, there wasn’t room to mount the LMSRA on the track the way it’s actually designed to work, but you can see a demonstration video here. It’s really incredible how quickly the ballast screener is able to take fouled ballast, remove the fines to the shoulder, and return a pile of clean ballast to the rail.
To return to the theme of sustainability, it’s not always obvious how companies specializing in track construction and maintenance can reduce their environmental footprint. However, implementing ballast screening is a way that you can increase sustainability and reduce costs. Ballast screening, even on smaller jobs, allows you to recover significant amounts of clean ballast from fouled track. This reduces the need for new ballast and the cost and environmental footprint of trucking the ballast to your job sites.
Railway maintenance companies in Europe regularly report paying for this ballast screener in well under a year. I highly recommend you consider implementing this for your operation.
If you have any questions about my trip or about the products in this story, please let me know. I’d be happy to chat.
Peter Scholtens
peter@integrityrailproducts.com