The north-south high-speed railway may not be completed on schedule, after track vibration buffers failed safety tests, Chinese-language media reported yesterday, although Taiwan High-Speed Rail Corp (THSRC, 台灣高鐵) officials said they will meet the deadline.
The buffer pads have failed three safety tests over the past year, the Liberty Times reported, without citing sources.
But THSRC vice president Edward Lin (林天送) said the tests are continuing and are not likely to delay the completion schedule.
Lin called the reports "a misunderstanding," saying the company has not changed its completion date.
A total of 170,000 vibration buffer sets will be used on the 300km railway, which is scheduled to begin operations in October 2005.
The buffers, which are inserted between the tracks and the railway base, have failed to meet European stability standards, despite improvements made by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, a partner in the Japanese consortium Taiwan Shinkansen, the report said.
Taiwan Shinkansen won the rail project in late 1999, beating its European rival Eurotrain.
THSRC has insisted on European standards for the rail tracks, while Mitsubishi has tried to meet such standards with Japanese components, the report said.
The report also said there have been disputes with the Japanese builders over how far European standards can be applied to Japanese rail systems, which use different technologies.
Mitsubishi is sending a team of engineers to Taiwan this week and another test is expected within two months, the report said.
The tests were conducted by the Institute of Applied Mechanics of the National Taiwan University.
Chen Chao-hsun (陳兆勛), a professor at the institute, said the railway's track fastener system "so far, has not met the regulations."
The problems must be rectified in the next month or two, before the institute completes its final report on the tests, Chen said.
To many, Tatu City on the outskirts of Nairobi looks like a success. The first city entirely built by a private company to be operational in east Africa, with about 25,000 people living and working there, it accounts for about two-thirds of all foreign investment in Kenya. Its low-tax status has attracted more than 100 businesses including Heineken, coffee brand Dormans, and the biggest call-center and cold-chain transport firms in the region. However, to some local politicians, Tatu City has looked more like a target for extortion. A parade of governors have demanded land worth millions of dollars in exchange
An Indonesian animated movie is smashing regional box office records and could be set for wider success as it prepares to open beyond the Southeast Asian archipelago’s silver screens. Jumbo — a film based on the adventures of main character, Don, a large orphaned Indonesian boy facing bullying at school — last month became the highest-grossing Southeast Asian animated film, raking in more than US$8 million. Released at the end of March to coincide with the Eid holidays after the Islamic fasting month of Ramadan, the movie has hit 8 million ticket sales, the third-highest in Indonesian cinema history, Film
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) revenue jumped 48 percent last month, underscoring how electronics firms scrambled to acquire essential components before global tariffs took effect. The main chipmaker for Apple Inc and Nvidia Corp reported monthly sales of NT$349.6 billion (US$11.6 billion). That compares with the average analysts’ estimate for a 38 percent rise in second-quarter revenue. US President Donald Trump’s trade war is prompting economists to retool GDP forecasts worldwide, casting doubt over the outlook for everything from iPhone demand to computing and datacenter construction. However, TSMC — a barometer for global tech spending given its central role in the
Alchip Technologies Ltd (世芯), an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) designer specializing in server chips, expects revenue to decline this year due to sagging demand for 5-nanometer artificial intelligence (AI) chips from a North America-based major customer, a company executive said yesterday. That would be the first contraction in revenue for Alchip as it has been enjoying strong revenue growth over the past few years, benefiting from cloud-service providers’ moves to reduce dependence on Nvidia Corp’s expensive AI chips by building their own AI accelerator by outsourcing chip design. The 5-nanometer chip was supposed to be a new growth engine as the lifecycle
RSS