About us

ISTrain

ISTrain is a railway engineering student team from Instituto Superior Técnico, University of Lisbon.

Founded in 2024, ISTrain is the first Portuguese student team dedicated to competing in the IMechE Railway Challenge. The mission is to design, build, test, and compete with an innovative reduced-scale locomotive, advancing railway technology through engineering and multidisciplinary collaboration.

As a young and ambitious team, the idea is to push the limits of what is possible in sustainable rail transport, while developing the technical and professional skills essential to be the next generation of engineers.

History

ISTrain was born from the initiative of a small group of students encouraged by Professor Hugo Magalhães. He challenged us to bring Técnico into the world of competitive railway engineering. With no existing railway-focused student group in Portugal, ISTrain began from scratch, but driven by enthusiasm, curiosity, and the desire to represent the country on an international stage.

Since its founding in December 2024, the team has united more than 30 students from multiple backgrounds with a shared goal: to build IST’s first competition-ready locomotive, "Andorinha".

Departments

At ISTrain, the division into departments ensures that all technical and organisational resources are used to their full potential. Each department tackles a critical area of the locomotive and the project as a whole.

The team is structured into five departments:

- Structures & Aerodynamics
- Powertrain & Energy Systems
- Vehicle Dynamics
- Electronics & Software
- Marketing, Operations & Logistics

Only with passionate, creative, and driven minds can we continue to develop innovative solutions for the challenges of railway engineering. These are the students who together with Hugo Magalhães, the faculity advisor, make everything we do at ISTrain possible: