BOSTON — Seven more of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority’s newest rapid-transit railcars have been found to have improperly installed bolts in brake assemblies, the agency’s board of directors learned Thursday.
The Boston Herald reports MBTA General Manager Steve Poftak told the board that six Orange Line cars and one Red Line car had the same issue that led to the breakdown of an Orange Line train on May 19. As a result of that incident, the agency took the 64 Orange Line and eight Red Line cars currently operating out of service for inspections [see “MBTA pulls cars from service …,” Trains News Wire, May 20, 2022]. It had started returning the cars to operation on Monday.
All seven cars have been returned to service, as have 58 of 64 Orange Line cars. The remaining six were scheduled to be inspected by the end of Thursday.
The cars are part of an order of 402 cars being built in Springfield, Mass., by a subsidiary of Chinese manufacturer CRRC. The agency will conduct further tests of the cars, and is requesting changes in the assembly process to ensure the bolts are correctly installed in the remaining cars in the order.
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