After four months of debugging and improvement work, China's first fully automatic mass production line for digital simulation "double-block crossties" has begun in Hechi.

The smart assemble line is equipped with more than 100 internationally-leading patented technologies, and its opening marks a milestone for smart manufacturing in China's high-speed railway sleeper industry.

The daily output of railroad ties has reached 1,600, and total output has exceeded 140,000 as of April 12.

The products manufactured in the city will be used on the Guiyang-Nanning High-speed Railway between Guizhou province and Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region, which has a designed speed of 350 kilometers per hour.

The Hechi section of the railway will pass through a karst peak cluster depression, which calls for a higher standard of railroad ties and creates difficulties for their production. To accomplish the task according to schedule, as well as to ensure the safety and stability of the trains, the production line needed to redouble its efforts to improve techniques, quality and production capacity.

"While speeding up the construction, we actively cooperates with the scientific team to tackle the production technologies such as digital simulation twins, intelligent robots, big data and cloud computing," Luo Lijun, project manager of Hechi Crosstie Factory of China Railway 14th Bureau Group said.

Now, just 12 technicians can complete the output that required more than 60 workers in the past. After optimizing the equipment and process further, the production line will only need six technicians in the future, Luo added.

The full automatic production line for railway ties in Hechi. [Photo/ Hechi Daily]