Union Pacific Railroad, USA: USA HHS for American heavy goods transport

Large quantities of wooden sleepers continue to be installed in the USA. Even so, environmental awareness is growing, along with the need for high-quality products with low life cycle costs. This situation led to collaboration between the US railroad company Union Pacific Railroad and RAILONE to develop the USA HHS (Heavy Haul Sleeper).

American heavy haul transport requires sleepers for axle loads of up to 36 metric tons
Production of heavy-haul sleepers for the North American market

 

Project details:

  • Lines in the North American rail network must be designed to cope with static axle loads of up to 36 metric tons
  • The UP11 HHS sleeper and its successor, the UP15, were customized to cope with both heavy loads, major mechanical influences and climate factors such as frost and de-icing salts
  • The high customer-specific requirements render special design components such as scallops necessary to help increase the sleepers' resistance to lateral displacement
  • Further projects followed, to develop under tie pads, guard rail applications and much more
  • Different rail-fastening systems can be used, such as SafeLok I, SafeLok III or W rail-fastenings
  • The sleepers satisfy both AREMA specifications and the requirements of European standard EN 13230
  • Annual production of up to 600,000 sleepers