Welding Fabrication Standards - EWF

Welding Fabrication Standards Page 83
Therefore CEN TC 256 WG 31 has started working on the development of a new European
standard for design, fabrication and maintenance of railway vehicles and components, which has
been developed as prEN 15085 in 2005 13 .
This document has been produced considering the commonly agreed best practice fabrication
criteria, as the main Customers (the national railway Companies) and Manufacturers were strongly
represented in this standardisation phase.
The standard will be composed by several parts, as follows:
- prEN15085 – 1: general guidelines and definitions;
- prEN15085 – 2: requirements for the Manufacturer;
- prEN15085 – 3: design requirements;
- prEN15085 – 4: production requirements;
- prEN15085 – 5: the guidelines of inspection, testing and documentation.
In the next paragraph only the requirements for the welding Manufacturer (as relates to part 2) will
be described.
9.2 prEN 15085-2 Requirements for the Manufacturer
Differently from other standards, this standard requires that the Manufacturer complies with
specific technical requirements, in order to demonstrate its capability to fabricate railway vehicles
and components. Such a capability must be evaluated and assessed by an authorised body
(“recognition of a welding Manufacturer”).
The standards defines different Manufacturer certification levels, taking into consideration the type
of product manufactured and the “safety relevance”, intended as complexity of the design and the
consequence of failure. Precise criteria for the definition of the safety relevance are still under
discussion.
Next table shortly summarizes the criteria for the identification of those levels.
Level Definition
New build, conversion and repair of rail vehicles and relevant components with high safety
1
relevance
2 New production of parts of railway vehicles with medium safety relevance
3 New production of parts of railway vehicles with low safety relevance
4 Design and/or assembly of railway vehicles and relevant components with High, medium or
low safety relevance, when welding activities are sub-contracted and not performed.
Table 23 – Identification of the level of the Manufacturer of railway vehicles and components
13 Because of the early stage of development of this standard, some of the information contained can be
subject to changes in the future. However the general approach to the standard should not be changed in
the future.
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