Following the change of Eurostar’s service from Waterloo Station to St Pancras, Advanced Handling was proud to be selected to design and build several different types of bespoke baggage trailers for use with their operational baggage trolleys at St Pancras International.

Happy with the trailers and the service, Eurostar approached Advanced Handling to help with a second issue resulting in wasted time and unnecessary expense. In adverse weather to increase the friction between the locomotive traction wheels and the rail sand is blasted onto the rail ahead of the driving wheels. At the end of the day once the train is back in the yard all remaining sand in the tank was purged out which left a mess in the yard and resulted in a loss of unused sand.

The design team worked closely with Eurostar to determine the best solution resulting in all manufactured trailers now in operation. Eurostar have since approached Advanced Handling to manufacture 128 ‘Sand Capture’ stainless steel boxes to help reduce outgoing costs.

The Advanced Handling technical design team created a bespoke solution which had the remaining sand purged into the box and collected. Each box is fitted with a dispensing pipe through which the sand is filtered and can be re-used. Each box is approx 1 metre long and can hold approx 15 kilos of sand.

Since introducing the sand capture boxes, Eurostar has reduced their outgoing costs. The sand is collected and re-used and less time is spent clearing wasted sand from the yard.

If you’re facing a similar challenge in your workplace, contact us on 01778 345 365 or email sales@advancedhandling.co.uk & we’ll be happy to help.