Supply Side: Bohr Electronics, INFORM

INFORM has launched its Syncrotess Optimization Plus system at Norfolk Southern’s Rossville terminal just outside of Memphis, Tenn. The Class I’s Austell facility near Atlanta, Ga., will deploy the system later this year. (Photograph Courtesy of INFORM)

Chattanooga, Tenn.-based Bohr Electronics introduces fuel transfer-pump repair for locomotive maintenance shops in North America. Also, INFORM deploys its stack management and crane optimizer system at the first of two Norfolk Southern (NS) terminals.

Bohr Electronics on Aug. 2 reported the debut of a fuel transfer pump repair service for North American locomotive maintenance shops. It specializes in priming pumps (4 GPM, 90 psi; 7 GPM, 90 psi) and pre-lube/turbo oak-back oil pump (3.5 GPM, 40 psi) repairs, along with replacing bearings, shaft keys and O-rings on any pump model. The company said it offers a standard one-year warranty on all repairs.

“Our commitment is to deliver quality, rapidity and reliability through this new service,” said Dan Marks, CEO of Bohr Electronics, an Alderman Enterprises company that manufactures and remanufactures electrical and electro-mechanical locomotive parts and components for freight and passenger railroads. “We’re not just fixing pumps; we’re offering a comprehensive solution that fulfills the most stringent performance and reliability standards and minimizes disruption to our customers’ operations.”

In related developments, Bohr Electronics in February landed an electrical cabinet contract from CSX as part of the Class I railroad’s locomotive rebuild program, and in April 2022, purchased K&L Electronics, a locomotive electrical component repairer and supplier based in Searcy, Ark.

INFORM on Aug. 2 reported launching its Syncrotess Optimization Plus system at NS’s Rossville terminal just outside Memphis, Tenn. The Class I’s Austell facility near Atlanta, Ga., will deploy the system later this year.

According to INFORM, the system “takes a modular approach to adding advanced intelligence” to a terminal’s existing TOS (Terminal Operating System). This path allows a user “to isolate the terminal’s specific challenges and provide a bespoke solution for [them].”

“After several successful live tests and careful planning, the entire team was confident in the solution going live at Rossville,” said Rafael Velasquez, Director of Optimization and Integration at the Terminal & Distribution Center Logistics Division of INFORM, an AI and optimization software firm based in Aachen, Germany. “Now, we’re laser-focused on the next challenge with taking the system live at Norfolk Southern’s larger operation in Austell.”

“Our add-on optimization approach has proven very successful in the North American maritime market, and I’m very excited to see that it is now up and running in the intermodal industry as well,” said Eva Savelsberg, Senior Vice President at INFORM’s Terminal & Distribution Center Logistics Division.

According to INFORM, NS is using the company’s Yard Optimizer (YO) to manage stacked operations. Working in conjunction with the TOS, the system is said to allocate storage locations for containers within the yard as well as a suitable handover location, or transfer spot, for external trucks to use to minimize travel distance for the container into and out of the stack.

INFORM has a suite of six optimization modules: Crane Optimizer (CO), Yard Optimizer (YO), Vehicle Optimizer (VO), Train Load Optimizer (TLO), Rail Scheduler (RS), and Machine Learning (ML).