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Which engineering program for developing trains?


trainsforever8

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trainsforever8

Hey guys, I'm hoping to get an answer here (especially if there are engineers within the forum who work in the railway field) because I have been asking universities in my city and they don't seem to be sure of what to recommend me.

 

So here's the thing:

 

I'd like to become an engineer and since I like trains so much, I really want to work in the railway field, especially in the conception and development of railway vehicles. Thing is, I am not sure wether I should go into Mechanical engineering or Electrical engineering (which I personally find more fun to study because of all the abstract math).

 

In general, I'd like to work on the development of the more "active" parts of the train (such as engines, traction motors, bogies, etc..). So I was wondering which program would you recommend me and if there are any concentrations/specializations during my studies that would be helpful, what are they? Also, is getting a masters degree a good idea?

 

Thank you!

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I can't help you directly (other than asking if you'd "like fries with that" ;) ), but what country/countries are you considering studying in?

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Not a railway engineer, but I am currently finishing a degree in Marine Engineering.  I'd recommend contacting the engineering department of the companies who are engaged in the sort of work you'd like to be doing, and try to start a correspondence with an employee who does your desired job.  If you ask about the path they took to get there, often they will have the answers to questions you didn't know to ask and you can learn from their mistakes.  It also can open doors for an internship or two, which can really help getting a job with those companies.  Active components would probably mean getting a degree in mechanical engineering,  but I can't say about the others.  Automation engineering for the controls is also a field to look into.   Remember a lot of design is done as components rather than in house, and locomotive and car builders are different than the railway company.  Let me know if you have any questions about transportation engineering I can answer, although I'm more on the operations and repair side in the maritime field (and some power generation) than design.

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trainsforever8
1 hour ago, railsquid said:

I can't help you directly (other than asking if you'd "like fries with that" ;) ), but what country/countries are you considering studying in?

 Well essentially, I'd like to study in Canada, however I'm open to making an exchange in another country such as Japan or Germany!

 

1 hour ago, Kiha66 said:

Not a railway engineer, but I am currently finishing a degree in Marine Engineering.  I'd recommend contacting the engineering department of the companies who are engaged in the sort of work you'd like to be doing, and try to start a correspondence with an employee who does your desired job. (...)

 

Let's say I go into mechanical engineering, would concentrating into Mechatronics be a good idea for trains? Since there's a little bit of both mechanical and electrical aspects to the program, I have a feeling it might be a good way to go. However some say that it would be too focused around robotics, which I'm not sure is useful for working on railway vehicles (correct me if I'm wrong).

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Actually mechanical engineering is great for the mechanical parts and the body construction, electrical engineering is great for the traction components like motos, while computer engineering is great for the control systems. In some parts of the world, the latter is just a specialization of electrical engineering. Actually my specialization was industrial automation, which an electrical engineering field that mixes mechanical and electrical systems with embedded programming.

 

The funny part is that designing a train is not done by a single engineer. Most electrical components are off the shelf and are combined by the design team, consisting of several different type of engineers and even designers, who are not even proper engineers, but some of the them do have industrial design engineer degrees. Yes, even that is a field, which is part mechanical engineering and part arts.

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trainsforever8
6 minutes ago, kvp said:

Actually mechanical engineering is great for the mechanical parts and the body construction, electrical engineering is great for the traction components like motos, while computer engineering is great for the control systems. In some parts of the world, the latter is just a specialization of electrical engineering. Actually my specialization was industrial automation, which an electrical engineering field that mixes mechanical and electrical systems with embedded programming.

 

The funny part is that designing a train is not done by a single engineer. Most electrical components are off the shelf and are combined by the design team, consisting of several different type of engineers and even designers, who are not even proper engineers, but some of the them do have industrial design engineer degrees. Yes, even that is a field, which is part mechanical engineering and part arts.

 

So basically it's very broad! I guess the electrical engineering part is also interesting because of the involvement in the motor part. It's true that many different types of engineers are part of the design of a train haha, I guess I'm looking for the job that would allow me to take a big part in the conception of the train. 

 

Do you work in the railway field?

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1 hour ago, trainsforever8 said:

Do you work in the railway field?

 

Usually not, but i did participate in one EMU project though. The funny part was that the design team, where i worked didn't really design any special components apart from the vehicle frame, just assembled off the shelf parts. For example, the bogies (both motor and trailer) came from an earlier project, the traction system was just a standard industrial traction control box from Siemens and the brake system came from Bosch as they were the nearest supplier. The whole process was mainly a Lego style puzzle to get everything together and make it work. The actual train design came from a very uninspired industrial designer, who just copied the Railjet control car front as it had the required crashworthiness and also looks ok, with minimal changes to avoid any legal trouble. The control bus just used industry standard components, so not much innovation there either.

 

Essentially there are very few new designs as most trains are produced as families, reusing components between projects. If you want to work on actual projects, it's better to contact the firm you would like to work and ask if they have a cooperation agreement with a university, so you could actually start working for them while studying. This also takes care of the required practice before graduation and the company may even fund some of your education (or all of it if they really need engineers). Most companies with local factories (mostly german firms and a few american ones) have these cooperation agreements with their local universities. In exchange, you only have to work for them for a certain amount of time, which would be your goal anyway.

 

ps: I wasn't jocking about limited railway designs though, most european firms have a continous product line, so almost each new train is an upgrade of their previous one. (this is how we have multiple generations of flirts and kisses, with each generation having lots of configurations, but use the same components) The eurosprinter/eurorunner series has been kept upgraded since 1992 and the current vectron family is just a progressive upgrade of the original design. This means that instead of revolutionary new designs, the main aim is an evolutional series of small upgrades and customizations and to reuse as many special components as possible, while using as much off the shelf technology as feasible. For japanese trains, i think the two large families are the jtrec and the hitachi platforms and most trains have very similar components with options selected based on the customer's requirements and budget. For Canada, i think the only large company that remains is Bombardier, with their Traxx locomotive line and Talent emu line. Asking them about if they have a university cooperation program might work.

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trainsforever8
8 hours ago, kvp said:

 

Usually not, but i did participate in one EMU project though.(...)

That's very interesting to know! And I'll send a message to railway companies about those coop programs, that would be the best thing!

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9 hours ago, kvp said:

 

Usually not, but i did participate in one EMU project though. The funny part was that the design team, where i worked didn't really design any special components apart from the vehicle frame, just assembled off the shelf parts. For example, the bogies (both motor and trailer) came from an earlier project, the traction system was just a standard industrial traction control box from Siemens and the brake system came from Bosch as they were the nearest supplier. The whole process was mainly a Lego style puzzle to get everything together and make it work. The actual train design came from a very uninspired industrial designer, who just copied the Railjet control car front as it had the required crashworthiness and also looks ok, with minimal changes to avoid any legal trouble. The control bus just used industry standard components, so not much innovation there either.

 

GySEV 4744?

 

https://c1.staticflickr.com/3/2949/34202986005_f989dae0c9_b.jpg

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In the US, there are many transit projects where we start new. Sure, they're typically derivatives of other projects (even if it's the basic sidewall construction) and we typically use more or less off the shelf components but there is a lot of custom 'packaging' involved. The carbuilders are generally responsible for building only the carbody and the trucks and then integrating everything to make sure it all works together. Some locomotive manufacturers also build their own prime movers but I think that there won't be too much new development work here since we've now reached Tier 4 emissions standards (in the US - there was a lot of development work to get to this level).

 

Even though my background is mechanical/structural, my bias is towards electrical as most EE's I've worked with typically grasp mechanical issues better than the other way around. Really any top level engineering undergraduate with a strong focus on industrial applications is good though be careful with EE as the focus tends to be more about computers than power. McGill comes to mind in Canada, Northwestern, Purdue, Lehigh are some that spring to mind in the US. Big names like MIT are also good though they tend to be more theoretical than practical. Either way, the key is to get a good solid footing in all aspects (EE, ME and Systems) and then look to get a Masters (possibly in Systems). Production experience is essential once you get out, the best bet in my opinion is to work for a small firm where you can get involved in all aspects of design, testing and manufacturing. Companies that do a lot of small, custom runs are ideal. People I know who've worked for the bigger companies tend to be more specialist than generalist but it's really about your preferences. Rail can be a bit of a roller coaster so also consider industries like marine, highway or off-road equipment. Big mining equipment is very similar in many ways to diesel locomotives. 

 

I work in the consulting business now which is a great way to be involved in lots of different projects. We typically get to write the specifications which is the start of the real design (or headaches) but I wouldn't recommend getting into that part of the business until you've gone through the challenges of production. 

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18 hours ago, trainsforever8 said:

Hey guys, I'm hoping to get an answer here (especially if there are engineers within the forum who work in the railway field) because I have been asking universities in my city and they don't seem to be sure of what to recommend me.

 

So here's the thing:

 

I'd like to become an engineer and since I like trains so much, I really want to work in the railway field, especially in the conception and development of railway vehicles. Thing is, I am not sure wether I should go into Mechanical engineering or Electrical engineering (which I personally find more fun to study because of all the abstract math).

 

In general, I'd like to work on the development of the more "active" parts of the train (such as engines, traction motors, bogies, etc..). So I was wondering which program would you recommend me and if there are any concentrations/specializations during my studies that would be helpful, what are they? Also, is getting a masters degree a good idea?

 

Thank you!

 

trainsforever8, have you found an answer to your question yet? Or are you still looking?

 

My wife's friend's husband seems to have a similar situation as you. He always loved trains. He became an engineer and wanted to work with trains if possible. As far as I know, he interned with Union Pacific. There he learned what kind of skills they needed. They offered him a job and gave him a stipend to go off and get a Phd in some specialized area of engineering. He's now finished his Phd, and is working for Union Pacific at their HQ. I'm not sure what specifically he does. I'm not an engineer. But he described it to me as, that he helps them to do whatever they want to do in the most efficient manner. I've only spoken with him once and it was a shortish conversation.

 

My wife tells me that he's pretty shy but if you're still looking for an answer to this, I don't mind asking if you could correspond with him by email.

 

 

 

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My father used to work for a railway rolling stock and industrial equipment manufacturer. He was part of the team creating trains from scratch to the final product, including production line.

He is an Electrical and Mechanical engineer. I guess it goes hand in hand, as far as I know you will need eventually to have both. You will be part of a team that includes mechanical engineers, electrical engineers, technical drawing people ( I think they call them designers now), etc.  If your intentions are to eventually to lead the “TEAM” successfully you will need to have all the qualifications or at the least most of their knowledge.

 

I know that the rolling stock manufacturer in question had partnership with the following manufacturers

 

ABB Ability/ Asea Brown Boveri/ Adtranz/ Daimlez-Benz/ DaimlerChrysler Rail Systems- Traction transformers, converters, reactors, motors, generators, turbocharges, surges, automation, etc.

Alstom Germany - Design, services and manufacturing trains, metros, bogies, traffic systems, services for freight wagons.

Siemens - Österreichische Bundesbahnen

Krauss-Maffei Wegmann GmbH & Co.

Henschel & Sohn

Brissoneau & Lotz

English Electrics

Bombardier

 

Kvp already mentioned Bombardier (Canada), in my opinion you should contact them and try to speak with someone involved in the rolling stock (an engineer or even the director in charge).

 

I had a business visit to the Alstom at Salzgitter in Germany back in 2000, were the company focuses on the production of railway vehicles for mass transit: metros and suburban trains, trams and regional trains. It’s quite impressive. 

You should email them and if you get the opportunity for a student exchange to go and study in Germany I’m sure they will be one good choice.

Edited by tavora
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On 2/1/2018 at 7:14 AM, kvp said:

Actually mechanical engineering is great for the mechanical parts and the body construction, electrical engineering is great for the traction components like motos, while computer engineering is great for the control systems. In some parts of the world, the latter is just a specialization of electrical engineering. Actually my specialization was industrial automation, which an electrical engineering field that mixes mechanical and electrical systems with embedded programming.

 

And Productioon Engineering if you want to get into  the operating part of railroading...

 

Cheers NB

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trainsforever8
On 2018-02-01 at 5:46 PM, gavino200 said:

 

trainsforever8, have you found an answer to your question yet? Or are you still looking?

 

My wife's friend's husband seems to have a similar situation as you. He always loved trains. He became an engineer and wanted to work with trains if possible. As far as I know, he interned with Union Pacific. There he learned what kind of skills they needed. They offered him a job and gave him a stipend to go off and get a Phd in some specialized area of engineering. He's now finished his Phd, and is working for Union Pacific at their HQ. I'm not sure what specifically he does. I'm not an engineer. But he described it to me as, that he helps them to do whatever they want to do in the most efficient manner. I've only spoken with him once and it was a shortish conversation.

 

My wife tells me that he's pretty shy but if you're still looking for an answer to this, I don't mind asking if you could correspond with him by email.

 

 

 

Thank you very much, I wouldn't want to bother you guys haha

 

I got great answers from everybody and a clearer view of what it's like to be an engineer in the railway field and the types of responsibilities that are given to such engineers. Perhaps I should just go into mechanical and do a masters in electrical or vice-versa. I contacted Bombardier and they said they have coops, but not in Canada for the moment. I don't mind however doing an exchange in Germany for that coop!

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Great thread! My son's only 11 but having career thoughts along this line as well. I've pointed it out to him.

 

Cheers eh,

 

Todd

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