i+weld
i+weld brings semi-automated technology to aluminothermic welding, cutting active labour time and physical strain so your crew completes more welds without losing the flexibility that make aluminothermic welding the standard for rail maintenance and turnout work.
What are i+weld products and how do they work?
i+weld is Pandrol's innovative semi-automated aluminothermic welding (ATW) process. It combines seven purpose-built technologies that automate the steps your crew would otherwise perform by hand: aligning the rails, sealing the mould, preheating, ignition, cooling and defect detection, all recorded through a single data platform. This keeps the low capital cost and flexibility that has made ATW the standard choice for maintenance and turnout welds, while closing the productivity gap with flash butt welding. Crews need only a few days' training to master the i+weld process, making it easier to scale your team when demand rises.
Speak to our rail expertsCuts active welding time by up to 15 minutes on every weld cast.
Reduces welder kneeling time in the ballast from 25 minutes to just 5.
Achieved a 100% weld acceptance rate across more than 100 field trial welds.
Product benefits
More welds per shift
Automated preheating and alignment save up to 15 minutes a weld, worth extra welds for your crew each shift.
Less physical strain
Automatic aligners and self-sealing moulds cut kneeling time from 20-25 minutes to around 5, substantially reducing physical strain on the teams.
Consistent weld quality
Field trials recorded a 100% acceptance rate across more than 100 welds, reducing rework and rejection.
Overview
i+ignite simplifies portion ignition. The welder positions the handgun and presses the trigger to light the charge, replacing the traditional "sparkler" igniter and removing the need to strike a naked flame close to the crucible by hand. This reduces the welder's exposure to the ignition point, in line with the safety improvements built into the wider i+weld system.
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Overview
The i+heat preheater sets up above the weld and runs the preheating sequence automatically, needing little or no monitoring from the welder. Field trials recorded a 100% acceptance rate across more than 100 welds, with similar results from a 1,000-weld tramway trial in Switzerland completed over eight months.
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Overview
i+align automates the alignment of the rail ends before welding, a step traditionally adjusted by hand with wedges. The welder sets the aligner and starts the sequence with a single button press. This removes a source of manual error and is particularly valuable on high-speed lines, where precise geometry is critical to ride quality and long-term rail life.
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Overview
i+seal moulds use an expansive strip that seals the mould automatically as the rail preheats, removing the need to lute the mould by hand with refractory paste or sand. This saves around five minutes per weld and removes a fiddly, time-consuming step from the process, without changing how the mould itself is set.
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Overview
Pandrol i+connect is the cloud-based app behind i+weld, gathering data from every stage of the process, including consumable batch numbers, timings and location, for precise documentation and monitoring. It gives supervisors a clear record of every weld cast, making it easier to track quality and flag anomalies across a whole network.
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- Urban & Transit
- Norway
Delivering Smoother, Quieter Light Rail Through Advanced Rail Welding
Bergen Municipality / 2020
Bergen Light Rail in Norway is a 21km light rail system with 27 stations. It began operation in 2010 and carries up to 60,000 passengers each day. The system is standard gauge, with platforms built to accommodate 44-metre long trams.
Related products
Below are other Pandrol products and equipment that can be integrated with this product. These complementary items can be used alongside this product, or are required for use with this product, or enhance the use of this product.
Discuss your Aluminothermic welding project with our team.
Did you know?
There are more Pandrol clips in service than there are people in Europe. Over three-times the amount to be precise. We have 3 billion clips in use and Europe has a population of around 750 million.