IEC 61375 Train Inauguration

Daily Coupling/Decoupling of a Train Consist is a routine operation around railyards and the IEC 61375 defines fundamental building blocks to achieve the interoperability between two or more trains.

The TTDP (Train Topology Discovery Protocol) is standard protocol (IEC 61375-2-5) that specifies the Train Inauguration procedure. It defines the common rules to discover the active Train Composition, configure the Train Data Communication System based on ethernet technology and automatically setup the IPv4 network.

TCN Communication Profile (IEC 61375-2-3) defines the standard interfaces of the Train Communication Network (TCN) to achieve data exchange between software applications throughout the Consist networks and guarantee communication interoperability across the entire ETB (Ethernet Train Backbone).

The TRDP (Train Real Time Data Protocol) is an open network protocol for applications’ communication over IP-based networks on rail vehicles.

All of these components are fully supported in VDS Rail devices. Interoperability of different networks and network types between Consists is thus ensured.

If you want to implement Train Inauguration according to IEC 61375, you can find more details at: https://www.vdsrail.com/en/solutions/iec-61375-train-inauguration.

The devices needed to implement this architecture, the Train Backbone Nodes and Integrated Train Backbone Nodes have been specifically designed to comply with industry standards. Please visit for further information: https://www.vdsrail.com/en/products/train-backbone-nodes.