VTM-performance: Vossloh's high-performance milling train

The evolution of milling

With its VTM-performance, Vossloh offers a mobile rail milling machine of globally unrivalled performance, safety and eco-friendliness – ideal for deployment on the European high-speed network:

  • advance of up to 2,000 m/h
  • 1,044 kW system power, 6 milling units
  • 0.3 to 3 mm metal removal per pass
  • reprofiling by plain milling
  • finishing by face milling – this means a treatment that is absolutely free of grinding and sparks

“We have put a great deal of passion and self-confidence into the development of the two VTM milling machines to be able to offer our customers innovative and extremely cost-efficient options also in the field of corrective rail maintenance.”

Marcel Taubert, Managing Director of Vossloh Rail Services

Technical overview

  • 3-part vehicle in walk-through design
  • Modular design and easy adjustability to various infrastructures
  • 14 m³ container for approx. 8 hours of independent shift operation
  • High degree of automation
  • Maximum reliability
  • Semi-automatic tooling change from inside the milling car; cutting tools mounted in cartridges for swift replacement
  • Easy servicing and maintenance for high availability
  • Integrated eddy current tester
  • Prepared for measuring systems for quality control
  • Resource-saving design: diesel-electric drive (Euro IIIB) with smart engine management (low noise emissions & eco-friendly energy recovery)
Data sheet VTM-performance

Driver's cab: more comfort & user-friendliness

  • 2 modern, ergonomic workplaces
  • Free view of the track
  • Sound level inside the cab: lower than required by the standards
  • Video surveillance of the milling engineering

A new dimension in working speed and surface quality

  • Roughing mill with plain cutter for the correction of the transverse profile & the elimination of various rail defects
  • Continuous milling process with an open- or closed-loop controlled rail tracking simulating a planer in the longitudinal waviness range of 300 – 1,000 mm
  • Transverse profile designed to leave a treatment allowance for the finishing cutter
  • Main milling wheels with a diameter of 1,400 mm for two operating modes:
    • removal of about the same metal quantity as with previous milling machines at significantly higher working speed between 1.2 and 2 km/h or
    • higher metal removal at the same speed, maximum removal of up to 3 mm in a single pass

 

  • Additional advantages of the increased circumference:
    • Flatter angle of contact for lower remaining waviness
    • Higher number of cutter tips
    • Through the combination of both, the number of cutter tips in contact is increased so that significantly lower cutting forces act on each individual cutter tip.
    • Reduced blunting of the tools results in longer service life
  • Finishing of the rail with fine milling vertical to the rail (finisher)
  • Thanks to the two intermeshing face cutters for the inside and the outside of the rail and a metal removal of 0.2 – 0.3 mm, longitudinal waves in the range of 10 – 300 mm are eliminated in conformity with DB specifications.
  • Areas of deployment of the two face cutters arranged one behind the other:
    • Finishing unit with a diameter of 300 mm in the “free” line areas
    • 70 mm unit for deployment in case of narrow clearance around the rail (e.g. in case of guard rails, axle counting systems, track switching and signalling equipment, etc.)
    • Fully automatic change during the ongoing operation by means of collision detection
    • For increased quality and flexibility in profiling, also continuous adjustment to the target profile in addition to the smoothing of the running surface

Surface quality after main milling and finishing

Main milling
Surface roughness (Ra) after completion <3 μm

Special characteristics of the tension clamp curve such as the second stiffness