With Collaboration Comes Evolution - Case study

Sales of GE’s new Evolution locomotive have been highly successful, in part because the engine is able to meet more stringent exhaust emissions regulations. In the development and production phases of the locomotive’s new engine, GE collaborated with valve train specialist Märkisches Werk, Halver, to design new valve components to help meet the engine’s demanding duty cycles.

With 13,000 locomotives operating worldwide and 6500 under maintenance service contracts, GE Transportation (GE) is a world-class leader. So when GE decided to develop a more fuel-efficient diesel electric locomotive designed to meet overexceeding new government regulations, the business invested six years and more than US$250 million dollars to create the GE Evolution Series locomotive. This lengthy process of research and development included pulling together customers, scientists and engineers from around the world to support the mission.

One team GE chose to partner within the development process was the engineering group from Märkisches Werk, Halver (MWH), located in Halver,Germany. With a strong history and working relation-ship, MWH was already a primary supplier to GE for intake and exhaust valves. For the launch of this new product line GE was interested in MWH’s expertise for other related system components such as springs, guides, seats and cones.

Ed Urquhart, CEO of MWH explained,“GE has created one of the world’s most technological advanced large-bore diesel engines. They are willing to takes risks, a refreshing difference in an ultra-conservative industry. It is exactly this risk-taking that has propelled GE to the top of the engine development world. We are thrilled that their new Evolution Series engine is supported by MWH components.”

Michael Colantoni, sourcing for GE Transportation, said, “They’re in the business of making products that are very reliable. As a major supplier to the marine industry, these parts cannot fail.

Colantoni explained that making environmentally sound diesel engines involves putting more demand on the structure of the components. They must be well designed,well manufactured, and must have very tight tolerances and specifications. The engines must work harder to operate properly to meet new government standards, as well as GE’s standards. “The components MWH made for us are taking a punishment.” 

Because MWH has a long-standing relationship with GE Transportation,they were called upon to help GE develop the Evolution Series. MWH was not only a trustworthy supplier with an outstanding reputation for reliability,but they also understood the fundamental platform of GE’s current diesel engines and had the products to meet their needs.

With its many years of experience developing diesel engine products, MWH became a critical player in helping GE determine the type of valves they need and the type of material the valves required to meet these new government standards.

MWH’s Urquhart further reinforced this point, “As a company, MWH organizes itself around the needs of our customers. In order to meet GE’s unique needs we had to make significant internal changes in a variety of functionalareas. This evolution, although challenging at times, has made us a bettersupplier across the board, not only for GE, but for our other customers as well.”

With a full year of production under its belt, GE has learned a lot from the process. “Our customers don’t want to hear that it’s going to cost more to meet the new government standards,” Colantoni explained that it was a challenge to meet their desired costs, and MWH’s expertise in this industry helped them better anticipate the cost structure and gave them ideas about how they could do things differently and better to meet their cost goals.

As the Components Engineer for the project, Krista Jeffries of GE stated, “MWH seemed to know what we were looking for, even before we stated it. They had suggestions for improvements to the process and material that we had not thought of, which resulted in important cost savings.” MWH achieved this because of its industry experience, expertise in cylinder assembly, and, of utmost importance their “willingness to always listen to our needs and make time for us,” Jeffries noted.

As a critical supplier to GE, MWH worked closely with GE to help them strategically address issues such as production planning to meet anticipated industry demand. Colantoni explained that it was important to think longer-term “earlier in the product development stage, such as asking questions about customer needs and what makes sense in terms of serviceability and maintenance.” By working as a team, MWH helped GE build more flexibility into the model by doing the hard work earlier on in the planning stage. Dr.Claus Schwab, director of sales for MWH explained, “We strive to make the seemingly impossible, possible by focusing our efforts on three core competencies: reliability, responsibility and the ability to react with ease to meet all of our customers’ needs to achieve mutual success.”