Amokabel Australia has secured its first major rolling stock contract, covering about 60 cable types for a new generation of Australian-built track maintenance vehicles, with production scheduled over six months.

The Amokabel Australia rolling stock contract covers 60 cable types for track maintenance machines, with local testing in Sydney.
Photo: Amokabel Australia

About 60 cable types for new maintenance vehicles

The order marks the entry of Sydney-based Amokabel Australia⁠ into rolling stock after a decade of supplying Australian rail-infrastructure cables, particularly for axle-counter applications through Track IQ, a Wabtec company.

Production will run over six months. The first order covers power and control wiring for the machines’ main systems. A following order will add smaller cables used for braking controls, lighting, instrumentation and accessories. The customer has not been named.

Mark Foster, Amokabel Australia’s general manager and sales director, told Rail Express⁠ that the contract is the local business’s first rolling stock project for an Australian manufacturer. Until now, much of the specialised cabling used in these locally built machines has been imported from Europe.

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Local finishing and testing in Western Sydney

Some cable types will initially be manufactured at Amokabel plants in Spain, then processed and finished at the company’s Western Sydney facility. Every cable supplied under the contract must meet low-smoke, zero-halogen requirements.

Customer engineers are expected to attend flammability, electrical and mechanical tests when the first batch arrives. Foster said local production could also shorten turnaround times for rail renewal work.

“You might have a 52-day shipping time for European cables, whereas we can produce cables locally in two to three weeks.”

A larger Australian factory planned for 2027

Amokabel plans to move from its current 2,000-square-metre factory to a facility three times as large in 2027. New machinery is expected to allow more manufacturing to be completed locally and support faster delivery.

The present contract covers only the unnamed customer’s Australian fleet. If performance meets expectations, Amokabel’s European headquarters is considering its Barcelona facility for wider global supply.

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