Engaged in a slew of activities, the Golden Rock Railway Workshop here has completed mass production of 50 new generation special type tank wagons meant for transportation of petroleum products.
The over 85-year-old Tiruchi workshop is the only railway workshop to produce the new generation Bogie Frameless Tank (BTFLN) wagons which are in line with the design of Ukrainian tank wagons.
The mass production was taken up after the Railway Board, New Delhi placed the order with the workshop, a pioneer in wagons manufacture, to make 50 BTFLN wagons.
The RITES, a Government of India enterprise under the aegis of Indian Railways, had supplied the design of the new generation wagons. This is the first time that the workshop had manufactured BTFLN tank wagons.
A senior workshop official said the wagons would transport kerosene, petrol, diesel and naptha. The volumetric capacity of each wagon is 76 cubic metres with its payload being 58 metric tonnes.
The BTFLN wagons are new generation wagons without under-frame between bolsters, the official said.
Now that the mass production was over, the wagons were ready for calibration to check the accuracy of the level of oil using flow meter, the official said adding that this would be done by a private agency.
The tank wagons were expected to roll out from the workshop in three to four months once the calibration works were over, said the official. These wagons would be supplied to the nominated railway.
In addition to BTFLN wagons, the workshop has also been manufacturing bogie low container wagons meant for the Container Corporation of India and BOXNHL wagons made of stainless steel.
Apart from these, the workshop also undertakes periodic overhaul of broad gauge diesel locomotives and passenger coaches. It had also dispatched four oil-fired steam locomotives to the Nilgiri Mountain Railway.
