CRRC unit unveils carbon fiber subway car with own technology

CRRC Changchun Railway Vehicles Co, a subsidiary of Stateowned trainmaker CRRC, on Sunday unveiled a prototype of the world's first lightweight subway car body made of carbon fiber.

The cars will be lighter, use less energy and release fewer emissions, as well as being safer, according to a post on the company’s WeChat public account.

The advance will lead to the mass application of carbon fiber as a material in the area of rail transit, noted the post. The company did not say when it plans to apply carbon fiber in mass production, it said its intellectual property rights guaranteed the mass adaptation of the material.

The car is 35 percent lighter than traditional metal-body subway cars, the post said, which will reduce wear and tear on the rails.

The company has proprietary technology for the carbon fiber body, which utilizes composite materials to cope with the structural requirements of rolling stock. The development of the new material also explored ways to set standards for the design, processing and quality checks.

In October 2017, the company produced the first China-made subway cars for Boston’s orange line as part of a 284-carriage order signed by the company with the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority in December 2014.

The deal was the first time a Chinese train car maker won a bid in the US market.