Vuyisile Sidyiyo

The New Rolling Stock Fleet Renewal Programme has provided me with an opportunity to be part of the Technical team since 2014.

I have been involved with

- Design phase (Design Program Meetings)

- Design Reviews (DRR)

- Validation

- Commissioning & Testing

- Factory Manufacturing - GIBELA Factory

- First Article Inspections

- Deployment & Support of the 3kV EMU till to date.

I have been acting as part of the PRASA's witnessing team and technical support in the process of validating that the train specifications that were contractually agreed upon are complied to or not.

Main Responsibilities at the GIBELA Factory and Wolmerton Depot

Line Manager - Mr Nick Tompkins

- Quality Inspections and Testing namely;

1. PC2 - Inspecting a single Car Body Shell (CBS) before fitment of equipment i.e. windows, doors, underframe equipment etc.

2. PC9 - Inspecting a fully fitted single car.

3. PC10 - Inspecting a complete train set at the manufacturing plant.

4. High Speed Testing - testing of brakes, stopping distances at PRASA's main line etc.

5. PC11 - Inspecting a complete train set at PRASA's premises after transportation from manufacturing plant.

- Managing 24 Quality Inspectors and the Testing Team at the Factory and Wolmerton Depot to complete the above mentioned tasks.

- Design changes on the train, continuous improvement - Through the Design Programme Meeting (DPM).

- First Article Inspections, Inspection of mechanical sub-systems with various OEMs and GIBELA.

- In March 2019, I was part of the team that was tasked to transport by rail the two EMU Trainsets to Cape Town region from Gauteng North. My role was to give On-Board Technical support enroute to Western Cape.

I did my training at the Braamfontein Depot

- Mechanical and Electrical Training on the train.

- Did Scheduled Maintenance on the Yellow trains.

(5M2As and 10M5s).

- Was involved with Testing and Commissioning of yellow trains at Koedeospoort Transnet and UCW (now Ubunye - Part of GIBELA).

- Did a lot of Mechanical Testing on components, from most suppliers.