CZ LOKO was awarded a contract of the Railway Infrastructure Administration (SŽDC) for the delivery of 50 new universal motor trucks (MUV) for a total of about 500 million CZK. The first one will be delivered in the autumn and the rest gradually over the next two years.
“The strategic decision to dedicate also to special vehicles apart from the development of locomotives has been bearing fruit for many years, which is confirmed by this contract as well. After years of work, we now offer our customers an exceptional vehicle that meets all the current track maintenance requirements. In this product category, we are among the absolute top in Europe,” says Josef Gulyás, Managing Director of CZ LOKO.
“In this way, SŽDC obtains special vehicles whose parameters and utility features will provide it mainly with high reliability, low operating and maintenance costs, safety and also unification with MUV vehicles previously modernized by our company,” says Jaroslav Plhák, Sales Director of CZ LOKO.
The maintenance vehicles with modern hydrostatic power transfer have a maximum speed of 75 km/h and therefore a large action radius. They are driven by Caterpillar engines with a power of 130 kW in the Stage IIIB emission category. Their advantages also include year-round use, which enables variability of superstructures and additional equipment, such as a hydraulic loading crane with various attachments, snow blower, plough, etc. They also feature a spacious cab with ergonomically tuned driver’s control panels and air conditioning. The vehicles will be prepared also for the installation of modern ETCS.
“Thanks to the finished specialization of plants, we are well prepared for this order. The plant specialization mainly brought complete separation of new production from repair activities, better work organization, optimized throughput of orders and quality, which is very important to the customer. In other words, everything repetitive serial production requires,” added the Sales Director.
SŽDC owns hundreds of “draisines”, some of which are more than 40 years old. However, it gradually replaces this no-longer-suitable rolling stock. “The new universal motor trucks will be more powerful, faster and able to tow trailers with a higher load than before,” said Jiří Svoboda, Deputy Director of SŽDC, at a recent railway technology fair in Ostrava.