Federal Railroad Administration technicians yesterday took apart a section of the locomotive to try to determine whether the problems were basic enough to be solved by simply installing longer bolts or if there were more serious design deficiencies.

The broken and missing bolts caused the latest in a series of delays for the new $2 billion high-speed train system, called the Acela, which originally was supposed to start running late last year. Once fully operating, the Acela will have three stops in New Jersey: Newark, Metropark in Woodbridge and Trenton.

Amtrak expects the 150-mph "bullet" train to transform travel in the Northeast by cutting two hours off the trip between Boston and Washington. Amtrak officials are banking on the high-speed train to provide needed revenue for the financially troubled agency by drawing passengers from air shuttles.

Rail advocates have welcomed the prospect of a high-speed American train, but the delays plaguing the Acela have cooled some of their enthusiasm.

"It's disappointing and disquieting," said Douglas Bowen, of the New Jersey Railroad Passengers Association. "Whether it's a fatal flaw or not, it's giving the impression that the program is not totally under control.

"We're not talking about the cutting edge in high-speed trains here," Bowen added. "This barely puts America back in the game. In Europe, their trains are doing 186 mph, and that's routine."

At present, the fastest train in this country is the Metroliner, which goes about 125 mph, Bowen said.

Federal Railroad Administrator Jolene Molitoris said the high-speed train technology used in the Acela has been tailored to the United State's rail safety requirements.

"It's not as simple as bringing a train over from Europe and putting it on a track," Molitoris said. "We are doing testing here in a very meticulous way."

The Acela's four sets of trains have been undergoing testing for months in Pueblo, Colo., and more recently along the Northeast route between Washington and Newark, logging roughly 40,000 miles.

Last week during the testing, one of the locomotives made unexpected lateral movements -- not so severe for someone riding the train to notice but enough to register on high-tech equipment, said Amtrak spokeswoman Lynn Bowersox.

An inspection of the locomotive found that a few of the many bolts connecting the engine's gear box to the frame were broken or missing, she said. Similar problems were discovered in a couple of the other Acela locomotives.

Molitoris said she hopes federal inspectors will soon resolve the problem so testing of the Acela can resume within a week.

Gilles Pagé, spokesman for Bombardier Transportation Inc., the train manufacturer, said he believed the bolt problems were due to "workmanship and not related to the high speed" at which the Acela travels.

"It's exactly the essence of testing to find out these things," Pagé said.

Supporters of the Acela predicted the series of minor delays will be long forgotten once the high-speed train is up and running.

"There's no question that people are going to ride this train instead of flying on those cramped air shuttles," said William Vantuono, editor of Railway Age, a monthly trade magazine.

"This train is going to be very special for the United States," Molitoris said. "I think there's a real pent-up demand for it."

For example, Molitoris said that once electrified tracks between Boston and New York cut that route's travel time from five to four hours, ridership jumped 64 percent.

The new train will cut that trip to three hours. The trip from New York to D.C. will take about 2 1/2 hours.

"Amtrak's biggest mistake was creating all this fanfare surrounding this new train and having this extensive marketing campaign when they hadn't even tested it yet," Vantuono said.

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Publication date: 2000-06-21