Anhui Province-based Chinese steelmaker Ma’anshan Iron and Steel Co. (Masteel) has announced that testing of 128 of its newly-developed steel wheels with 1.25 meter diameter for high-power train locomotives has been successfully completed in trials carried out on the Datong-Qinghuangdao and Lanzhou−Xinjiang railways. In the tests, the wheels covered distances of over 200,000 kilometers, with some wheels clocking up distances of around 500,000 kilometers.
According to Masteel, the wheels in question are only produced by a small number of countries in the world, including Germany and the Czech Republic. China’s Ministry of Railways has been cooperating with Masteel on development of this product since December last year.