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Kiruna Wagon wins Swedish Steel Prize 2017

It was all champagne wishes and caviar dreams for Swedish company Kiruna Wagon at the awards presentation May 11 in Stockholm for the Swedish Steel Prize 2017. Sponsored by Nordic and U.S.-based steel company SSAB, the international competition aims to inspire and disseminate knowledge about high-strength steel and how it can be used to develop stronger, lighter, and more sustainable products. Kiruna Wagon took home the top prize among 102 contenders for its Helix Dumper wagon system for long-haul rail transport and efficient unloading of minerals.

Kiruna Wagon used high-strength steel to develop a highly durable and far more efficient wagon solution than other ore wagons on the market.?

"Kiruna Wagon has successfully updated a good idea and used high-strength steels to turn it into a brand new, superior wagon solution," said Eva Petursson, chairman of the Swedish Steel Prize jury and head of SSAB's Strategic R&D.

Use of advanced high-strength structural and wear-resistant steels in Kiruna Wagon's Helix Dumper made it possible to design lightweight wagons combined with a stationary Helix terminal for on-the-fly rotary unloading. The ingenious solution has an unloading speed of 25,000 tons per hour, which is twice that of other systems. With its nearly doubled unloading rate, the Helix system is superior to all conventional solutions and solves many problems related to sticky aggregates.

For the final design, both Strenx structural steel and Hardox wear-resistant steel were used in the wagon solution.

When comparing with other systems, a complete unloading system for the Helix costs 1/7th of what a rotational wagon costs. Furthermore, the Helix uses parts of the potential energy of the ore to push the wagon forward as it unloads. This means no extra energy is required, and there is much less dust with almost no noise.

The Swedish Steel Prize was established by SSAB in 1999, and this time marked the 18th time the prize was awarded. The winner received a statuette by the sculptor Jörg Jeschke and a cash prize of SEK 100,000 (almost $12,000). SSAB encourages the winner to donate the cash prize to charity.

The other finalists, Fermel from South Africa, JMG Cranes from Italy, and Wabash National from the United States, were runners-up in the Swedish Steel Prize 2017 competition.

"This year, a record number of 102 applications were sent in from 32 different countries around the world," said Petursson. "The high overall quality of the applications shows that this prize has an important role in promoting and even encouraging the industry to find new and innovative ways to use high-strength steels for higher performance."

The runners-up

Fermel, mining vehicle, South Africa

Fermel has developed a unique range of multi-purpose vehicles for safe transportation in mines. The vehicles meet new, more stringent safety legislation and are intended to replace the re-built standard vehicles currently used. Design optimization of the entire vehicle, including the car body, has given superior performance regarding personal safety, higher payload, agility, damage resistance, reliability, and service life. All these benefits are achieved by extensive use of advanced high-strength structural and wear-resistant steels.

JMG Cranes, electrical pick-and-carry crane, Italy

JMG Cranes has developed a unique, highly compact crane with an extended field of application. The lean design combined with electric drivetrain and excellent maneuverability allows it to be used both indoors and outdoors. This powerful pick-and-carry crane has great lifting capacity. Its high performance-to-weight ratio has been obtained by an optimized boom design utilizing ultra-high-strength steels. Additionally, efficient road transportation is made easy by removable support legs and counter weights.

Wabash National, rear impact guard, USA

Wabash National's new rear impact guard for trucks and semi-trailers exceeds North American standards for demanding off-set impact. The optimized design utilizing high-strength structural steel has been verified through extensive full-scale testing that shows superior performance in protecting the people in the colliding car. The patented system gives excellent energy absorption, minimum damage to the heavy vehicle, and has highly cost-effective manufacturing and assembly.

Other recent winners
The last time the prize was given out (2015), the jury had entries from 28 countries to evaluate. The Finnish innovator Ponsse won for designing a new, innovative, and cost-effective roller feeder for forest harvesters (see Designfax story here). The winner before that (2014) was the Belarusian company Belaz, who built the world's largest dump truck with the help of high-strength steel (see Designfax story here).

Read more about the Swedish Steel Prize at www.steelprize.com.

Source: SSAB

Published April 2017

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