SAIL MEETS TOUGH IR
STANDARDS
Steel Authority of
India Ltd. (SAIL) has taken steps to meet the exacting standards
demanded by the Indian Railways (IR), the largest customer for
supply of rails, wheels and axle. SAIL’s Bhilai Steel Plant in
Chhattisgarh had already taken up modernization of its rail mill
to ensure supply of 26 metre long rails. Durgapur Steel Plant
(DSP) in West Bengal, has just commissioned the latest online
testing facilities in its wheels and axle plant to meet the Railway’s
demand.
The facilities which
cost DSP a sum of about Rs. 8 crore, would help maintain tough
revised IRS standards, considered to be the best in the world.
The plant has installed and commissioned universal and brinell
hardness testing machines and other facilities. It has also got
online ultrasonic and online magnetic particle testing machines.
The new facilities are helping the plant to make very stringent
quality checks as each and every wheel going out of the plant.
DSP has shown greater
flexibility in accepting orders from the IR. Till the early nineties,
its wheel and axle plant produced mainly broad guage (BG) coaching
wheels. It developed BG loco wheels in December, 1994 and then
metre guage (MG) loco wheels last year. The plant also plans to
develop, within the current fiscal, S-profile BG loco wheels and
LHB wheels.
The IR are in the
process of upgrading and modernizing the largest railways network
in the world. This would be done by going in for faster trains,
longer rail sections and optimizing rail traffic to cater to every
region and section of the populace. DSP is increasingly providing
to be its dependable ally.
