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industrial buildings special report
BUILDING PROJECTS
Pictured: The frontage of Hitachi's flagship European manufacturing plant makes a strong industrial statement
as material deliveries, vehicle shunting and worker movements. These scenarios have helped define and drive the key elements of the building. The Newton Aycliffe facility has been designed to enable it
to construct trains of varying size, design and complexity – not just the Intercity Express class of trains. In fact it will soon be operating simultaneous production lines for the Intercity Express and AT200 electric trains recently ordered for Glasgow to Edinburgh services. It also has the capacity to build-double- deck rolling stock for potential export to continental Europe. Two crucial pieces of equipment that facilitate that are the bespoke electrically-powered traversers – or transfer tables.
These huge pieces of moving equipment enable individual rail vehicles weighing up to 80 tonnes to be effortlessly shifted sideways from one track to the next during the manufacturing process. Developed and produced by specialist Sheffield company Mechan, they remove the need for a heavy lifting crane both inside the factory and outside. In the rail industry safety is always a business-critical factor
and, consequently, Hitachi Rail Europe has a ‘no cables on the floor’ policy for its new factory. Elliott adds: “The facility needs well organised utility feeds
to its 46 assembly workstations, and we utilised the overhanging pivot arms on the columns and other manufacturing structures
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