High-Speed Railways in Spain

The rapid growth of high-speed rail in Spain has encouraged Spanish companies not only to create products that meet the demands of the Spanish market but to innovate in ways that allow these companies to compete on an international market as well.

In the early stages of the AVE in Spain, without strong home-grown high-speed rail technology available, French and then later German technology provided the mechanisms to reach the necessary speeds. But the clear and growing market for high-speeds trains within the country provided the motivating factor for two veteran Spanish rail companies, Talgo and CAF, to develop those trains.

Talgo began as a rail company in 1942, when a Spanish engineer tested a new system for axles to avoid wear and tear on train wheels. In the following decades, Talgo provided trains for a variety of specific Spanish needs. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Talgo engineers developed trains that reached then high speeds of 200 kilometers per hour. Talgo began providing high-quality, inexpensive high-speed trains in the early 1990s.

“In 1988 we came to the conclusion that we had to prepare ourselves for the growth of high-speed rail in Spain and in general in Europe,” said José Luis López Gómez, technology director for Talgo. So the company tested a new train on a testing bench in Germany and reached the record-breaking speed of 500 kilometers per hour, though this speed is not yet feasible in the real world because of physical and signaling constraints.

CAF was founded in 1917, providing parts and trams for Spanish lines, including the first metro in Madrid. The company formed an R&D department in 1969. “That to me is the most important date in the company,” says a spokesperson for CAF, “because that’s when we began to develop our own products.”

A Spanish disadvantage—mountainous terrain and frequently curving tracks—led to one Spanish innovation. Because of centrifugal force, as trains travel around curves, the speed pushes the train—and therefore the cars and the passengers within—to the outside of the curve, something that is known to cause passengers a fair amount of discomfort. This effect could also force trains off the rails. To avoid both results, trains often slow down at curves.

Both CAF and Talgo have developed proprietary technology in something called “tilting” trains. Tilting technology detects where and when the track curves, and the train then realigns the suspension through a variety of systems and equipment so the train actually tilts into the center of the curve. This allows even conventional trains from both companies to travel at higher speeds through the curves.

Another particularly Spanish disadvantage has also paved the way for innovation. In the mid to late 1800s, when Spain was first developing its rail network, the country made a deliberate decision to use a gauge, or rail width, different from most of the rest of Europe. The Spanish gauge is 1668 millimeters wide, while the European norm is 1435 millimeters—a difference of more than 200 millimeters. Some experts say this different standard may have been adopted because of concerns over the possibility of invasions from neighboring countries; others say that at the time people believed a wider rail would work better with steam engines. Though the exact reason remains unknown, Spain was left with a major challenge in the development of cross-border travel and trade. Until recently, any train that wanted to cross from Spain to France had to stop, the wheels had to be totally reorganized, and the front car and engine had to be changed.

Talgo developed an automatic gauge-switching system that works in the following way. The train slows down to about 15 kilometers per hour when it reaches the switching station, which contains the original track and the new gauge alongside. At the station, there are lateral guides alongside the track. When the train encounters these guides, its weight transfers, freeing up the wheels and unlocking the bolts that hold the wheel system in place. The wheels automatically move to the newer gauge, and the locks set once again, transferring the weight back to the wheels and off the guides.

CAF trains also operate with a proprietary system developed along the same principles. The guides take the weight of the train and unlock the wheels. As the train slides along the guides, loosening the axles within the system, the wheels readjust to the new gauge and are locked into place; then the train once again picks up speed. In both systems, a gauge change—which in the past took up to an hour—takes only about four seconds. Talgo has been operating gauge-switching trains between Barcelona and Geneva since 1968 and between Madrid and Paris since 1980.

Today, the issue of changing gauges along a rail line is about more than frontiers. Spain made the decision to have all new rail lines, the high-speed lines, built at the European gauge width to facilitate movement between countries. Within Spain today, high-speed lines at European widths meet conventional lines at Spanish widths. CAF is operating trains along the Madrid-¬Barcelona line that change gauges without stopping.

Not only does this new technology allow Spain to easily move people and goods beyond Spanish borders, but it is opening up a new market to CAF and Talgo beyond the borders as well. Though most countries in Europe built trains to the European gauge standard, some countries in the former Soviet Union have a gauge wider than the norm. Talgo tested this system at the borders between Sweden, Finland, and Russia. China and Japan have also expressed interest in the mechanism.

CAF and Talgo are both supplying trains to the Spanish high-speed rail market, and CAF has recently sold the first high-speed rails out of Spain for the new line between Istanbul and Ankara in Turkey.