Recent media reports that the introduction of Amtrak’s new Avelia Liberty trains (If it’s America, it’s always ‘liberty’ or ‘freedom’) manufactured by France’s Alstom are facing yet another delay of 18 months, pushing the total delay to more than three years. The cause? Surprising, to say the least. To begin, under new instructions to ban everything Chinese, the company had to turn to France to purchase their rolling stock, but what Amtrak has purchased is 3 generations old in China, at the very bottom of anything that today would be termed “high-speed rail”, and is old in France as well. Reading between the lines, it seems Alstom agreed to reproduce some older-technology equipment to match America’s abilities, but things haven’t gone so well.

According to Amtrak executives, the need for more testing is the cause of things being behind schedule, with Amtrak citing “rigorous” testing “required by federal regulations”, somehow implying American safety standards of exceptional rigor, but the details seem to tell a different story. In fact, a review of the details reveals that the real cause was “the discovery of compatibility problems with the Northeast Corridor tracks that prompted modifications to the train design”, as well as “an incompatibility with . . . its catenary system” – which is the overhead electrical source that provides power to the trains.[17]

If this isn’t clear, Amtrak executives discovered, no doubt to their complete amazement, that the trains they purchased didn’t fit the tracks on which those trains would run, nor could they connect with the available overhead power sources. The spin placed on this by Amtrak executives was that “The train had to be modified to work harmoniously with the infrastructure.” However, it wasn’t an issue of ‘working harmoniously’, but of working at all. Amtrak provided to Alstom the design necessities for 30 new train sets, which were manufactured to those specifications but, when delivered, the company discovered their design was so badly flawed that the new trains didn’t match the trackage or the power supply, and had to be modified. This sounds like a Three Stooges episode or a Jackie Gleason comedy. How is it possible for thinking persons to design and manufacture trains that can’t fit their own tracks?

READ MORE: CHINA HAS more than 38,000 KILOMETRES OF FAST TRAINS TRACKS.....

Gus: Didn't we have similar "Californian" problems in Sydney, when trains were ordered with the wrong specs? What about the new "really ugly" ferries that are too high for pasengers to stay on the top deck when going under bridges?

Meanwhile, going back a few years, say the previous elections (2019) when politics was being cooked up by miraculous ScoMo, the Fast Train Dream on Australia's east coast was being "studied"....

Brisbane commuters will be able to catch a bullet train to either the Sunshine Coast or Melbourne — depending on who wins the next federal election.

Labor has reignited the decades-long dream to build a high-speed train from Brisbane to Melbourne, promising to appoint a High Speed Rail Authority if elected.

READ MORE: https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/5992374/the-duelling-rail-plans-for-south-east-queensland/

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MEANWHILE:

Technology Transfer is not Free

Whenever the subject of technology transfer arises, there seems to always surface a flurry of accusations about copying or stealing. Readers should carefully note that China did not “steal” anyone’s rail technology; instead, it was all purchased. China paid billions of dollars for that transfer of technology. It is the same in all important industries today. China has the money, and is willing to pay handsomely for technology it needs to further its development.

To compensate for a late start, the Chinese government began (in only 2004) by purchasing rail technology abroad, signing agreements with Alstom and Kawasaki to build HSR train sets for China in cooperation with local firms. Kawasaki, who designed the original Hayate bullet train, signed a deal with the Chinese ministry of Railways for the transfer of a full spectrum of HSR technology. They began with Kawasaki manufacturing 50 HSR train sets in Japan and exporting these to China fully-assembled, then progressed to establishing factories in China where Kawasaki helped the Chinese manufacturers to produce another 50 train sets locally. China also paid Kawasaki for the training of manufacturing staff first in Japan and then at the factories in China. This process carried a heavy price; the arrangement with Kawasaki cost China around $800 million, plus countless millions for training and many technology updates. The contract with Kawasaki included “the transfer of the whole spectrum of technology and know-how for the bullet train”, so that these trains became in fact Chinese-owned IP.

With this experience under its belt, China then duplicated the process with Siemens, Alstom and Bombardier, in similar deals for a full transfer of technology and IP rights so that China could freely manufacture these train sets domestically and sell them internationally. Similar to the procedure with Kawasaki, Chinese engineers were sent to Europe for extended periods of study and also had these firms assist China in establishing domestic manufacturing facilities. All the firms trained Chinese engineers while helping the country develop its own supply chain for train components, and all of this involved several billions of dollars in fees.

But it wasn’t all gravy because the Chinese rail companies paid billions of dollars for was in fact old technology from those four companies. Knowing the Chinese wanted to produce trains based entirely on their own IP and technology, Kawasaki and Siemens in particular refused to sell their more advanced products and would sell China only rail technology that was already two or even three generations old. These foreign companies were actually planning to take full control of China’s vast market for HSR transportation, expecting to fully supply the “the most ambitious rapid rail system in history”, with rewards in the billions.

That did not deter the Chinese. As a first step they disassembled, evaluated, and combined all those technologies into one train, combining the best features of each. Then, they applied their formidable R&D abilities to improve and enhance those features and create entirely new trains built exclusively on Chinese-owned IP. The result was trains that were faster, smoother, quieter, and less expensive than the newest generation of their former suppliers. To say that the foreign firms underestimated the power of Chinese innovation and the speed and quality of R&D in China, is an understatement of some magnitude, with both Kawasaki and Siemens finding themselves left at the starting gate only a few years later.

“The Western firms confused their head start with their R&D capacity, attributing both to natural superiority, confidently assuming they were more innovative rather than simply having begun earlier. The assumption was that Japanese and German R&D capability coupled with their huge lead would maintain an impassable gap and permit them to capture the entire Chinese market.” Their willingness to sell their technology was from an expectation that the Chinese would need at least 30 years to absorb and implement it before being ready to proceed on their own. The reality was somewhat different: they found themselves having to compete with Chinese firms who adapted and improved their technology and produced superior products only three years later.

READ MORE: 

https://www.unz.com/lromanoff/chinas-high-speed-trains-america-where-are-you/

GusNote: the last thing that China wants is war. The first thing that the US want is war. China is mostly a country of technicians (including new farmers) and engineers, the US are a country of mad warmongers....

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