In late 2024, Ukrainian industrial company Interpipe completed a major contract to supply 10,000 railway wheels to Indian Railways, the Indian state-owned company that operates the entire Indian railway network, ahead of schedule.
Interpipe announced this in a statement, the CFTS portal reports.
The one-year contract provided for the supply of 1000-mm-diameter standard freight wheels for gondola cars and boxcars of the BOXN Wagon type.
The company noted that logistics was a particular challenge. According to the company, most of the wheels were shipped through European seaports, while the last batches were shipped from Ukrainian ports. The shipping crisis in the Red Sea resulted in an increase in transit time to India, as the newly established route goes around Africa. Nevertheless, the entire volume of product was delivered to the customer on time.
"The company has been a partner of Indian Railways for over 25 years. This large one-year order was the first since the Russian military invasion of Ukraine, so it was extremely important for us to fulfill it successfully and ahead of schedule. We received the next order from Indian Railways in January, and we plan to double the volume of deliveries of freight wheels to the Indian railway operator in 2025," said Oleksandr Harkavyi, director of Interpipe’s Railway Products Division.
As the CFTS portal reported, Interpipe developed an improved wheel design for Indian Railways’ rolling stock in 2021. The wheel was designed based on the operating conditions in India. Thanks to the new design, the Indian railway operator expects a significant improvement in railway safety after repairs of passenger cars.
