Article: How DB Fahrzeuginstandhaltung has responded to the pandemic
The coronavirus pandemic has affected everyone in recent weeks. DB Fahrzeuginstandhaltung is doing everything possible to overcome the current challenges and continue to serve its customers.
Early on in the pandemic, DB Fahrzeuginstandhaltung set up a crisis management team to assess the situation on a daily basis and decide on appropriate measures to take in response. The projects assigned to the maintenance depots were prioritised in terms of their importance for railway operations, so that they could be carried out according to urgency. Close coordination between the rail vehicle spare parts logistics centre, purchasing department and suppliers has safeguarded the flow of material to keep production going. The pandemic also threatens the reliability of international supply chains. One of the remedies here is 3D printing, which can be used to produce headrests, housing covers, microphone brackets for driver's cabs, and the like. It can even print sand traps made of titanium.
While most office staff can work from home, production staff have to be on site to do their jobs. They are assigned to fixed teams to keep the number of contacts as low as possible, with the same people working together in early, late and night shifts. Shift changes run without contact to prevent too many people coming together. Door handles and other frequently used surfaces are regularly disinfected, and employees are also provided with masks of the kind that are currently compulsory in shops. Many of these masks are made in in-house upholstery workshops.
3D printing produces equipment such as hands-free door openers and face visors, which are supplied to staff across Deutsche Bahn. The visors were developed together with the „DRK Kliniken Berlin Westend“, where they are also now in use. The hospital has received donations of 100 of visors, while another 300 have been donated to the „Johanniter-Unfall-Hilfe”.