Reliability of rail infrastructure depends on proactive maintenance practices

Reliability of rail infrastructure depends
on proactive maintenance practices

Dingo strengthens partnership in rail industry

According to industry data and public information available from governments worldwide, there are currently major rail infrastructure projects underway on six continents. A healthy and well-maintained rail infrastructure is critical for commercial and passenger transport applications around the world. 

“Canada’s transportation system is critically important to facilitating the flow of mined and refined products to markets in Canada and abroad,” writes Paul Stothart of the Mining Association of Canada. “Minerals and fabricated mineral products provide significant tonnage and revenue for Canada’s transportation system, particularly bulk commodities such as iron ore, coal, potash and sulphur.”

In its annual Transportation in Canada publication, published in May 2008, Transport Canada reports that the minerals and metals sector (coal, fertilizer, iron ore, ores and metals) accounted for 48 percent of the 282 million tonnes in commodity volumes carried by railroads in Canada in 2007. According to Statistics Canada, shipments of crude and processed minerals transported by Canadian railways represent approximately 60 percent of total rail revenue freight. 

Dingo, the world leader in providing solutions to heavy asset-intensive operations, in recent years has focused primarily on working with mining clients to maximize production, significantly reduce maintenance costs, avoid catastrophic in-service failures and keep mining assets available. Just as we recognize that keeping production equipment available is critical to our clients, it is equally critical that the rail infrastructure that is designed to move the metals and minerals to the marketplace is properly maintained and available.

Recently, Dingo announced a strengthening of our partnership with Scientifics Ltd., the United Kingdom’s leader in laboratory-based oil condition analysis and monitoring. Dingo and Scientifics signed their third, multi-year contract to bring Dingo’s Trakka™ software to the rail industry. To read the entire Scientifics news release, click here.

English, Welsh and Scottish Railway, now a part of the German rail group DB Schenker Rail (UK), is the largest operator of mainline freight locomotives within the UK, with more than 500 locomotives. Oil condition monitoring has played an important role in asset management for more than 30 years, resulting in increased fleet availability, reduction in maintenance costs and in-service failures. Michael Heaton, Power Equipment engineer for the Engineering Support Group, said, “We have been using Dingo Trakka™ since the beginning of 2008, when it replaced Dingo’s Maintenance Guy software. It is an easy-to-use system, allowing us to control our oil analysis process and take appropriate action in a structured manner. It meets all the requirements we have for this purpose.”

If you are interested in rail lubrication solutions from Dingo, you are invited to visit Dingo at www.dingo.com or contact us directly by phone, toll free, at +1 888-346-4630, or by e-mail at bwilliams@dingo.com.