Maglev transport systems present an attractive option for the mobility mix. They're quick and quiet, and are low maintenance. But setup can be costly and complex. Italy's IronLev is looking to change that with a passive system that runs on regular rail tracks.
IronLev was founded in 2017 as a joint venture between engineering innovation studio Girotto Brevetti and Ales Tech, a startup formed by university students who developed a suspension system for the SpaceX Hyperloop competition.
Instead of using significant amounts of power to run a maglev transport system based around electromagnets, the collaboration has tapped into passive magnetic forces to create a "cushion of air that physically separates the vehicle from the track."
At company launch time, a technology demonstrator of the U-shaped passive ferromagnetic levitation technology had already been built and tested under lab conditions. This was followed in 2018 with a trolley platform hosting a Tesla EV weighing 2 tons that was moved "with a simple light hand pressure."
"Thanks to the features of our technology and to low and speed independent frictions, we can move a 10-ton wagon with the same force that is needed to lift a 22-lb backpack," claimed company co-founder, Luca Cesaretti. "And we aim at cutting the infrastructure costs tenfold with respect to existing systems."
Indeed, where conventional maglev networks involve heavy investment in new infrastructure, the idea here is to make use of more than 1.5 million kilometers of existing iron railways tracks around the world. And now the team has now taken a test vehicle to a 2-km (1.2-mile) stretch of rail track on the Adria-Mestre route in cooperation with the Veneto Region of Italy.
The prototype suspended on magnetic skids weighed in at a ton and managed to get up to a self-limited speed of 70 km/h (43.5 mph) thanks to motors at each skid. The team hasn't revealed any further details on the latest prototype, but stresses that zero modifications were made to the tracks and that no elements were added to the infrastructure.
IronLev is also claiming that its patented technology is "extremely cost-effective," but as we noted in our coverage of the similar Sky Train setup in China a couple of years ago – albeit a suspended carriage system – permanent magnets can be an expensive commodity, with a high percentage of rare earth metal production controlled by China.
As such, we'll have to wait for the project to move closer to a real-world commercial debut as "people-mover transport systems for sustainable and low-noise mobility solutions in urban environments." The next step in that process will be building a 20-tonne vehicle and ramping the speed up to 200 km/h (124 mph).
Source: IronLev
