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Oct 14, 2023

'It will change the way we travel': Elk Grove company builds Hyperloop components

Hyperloop transportation promises a speed of 700 miles per hour Hyperloop

Hyperloop transportation promises a speed of 700 miles per hour

Hyperloop transportation promises a speed of 700 miles per hour

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Hyperloop transportation promises a speed of 700 miles per hour

At nearly two-stories tall and weighing over 84,000 pounds, the Hyperloop gate valve is one of the largest pieces ever designed, manufactured, and assembled at the GNB Corporation's Elk Grove facility.

The company is building the component for Hyperloop Transportation Technologies, an industry leader in developing the high-speed, high-tech mode of travel.

Hyperloop capsules travel through a pipe that has had the air sucked out of it. In the vacuum, the capsule faces little wind resistance, allowing passengers to travel at 700 miles per hour.

A Hyperloop could reduce the travel time between San Francisco and Los Angeles to just 45 minutes.

"We make the enclosures, we make the gate valves, we make the flanges and fittings and all of the vacuum hardware. Somebody else makes the vacuum pumps, the controls and the electronics and other things that go with it," said Ken Harrison, president of GNB Corporation.

For Hyperloop, GNB has built a massive gate valve that allows workers to isolate a section of pipe for maintenance while the rest can remain in a vacuum.

The gates will be placed every seven miles along the track.

"It's sized so that you can vent that section of tube and work on it overnight, you can't pump down 100 miles of tube overnight," Harrison said.

The first gate valve will be shipped from Elk Grove to Toulouse, France, where research and development are well underway on the Hyperloop.

A second gate will be shipped to Abu Dhabi. Construction will begin there on the first commercial application of the Hyperloop.

For GNB, a company of 70 employees, the construction of gate valves in Elk Grove is a source of pride.

"Most people have no idea such a thing happens here in Elk Grove and yet we sell products for industries all over the world and it is really high-tech," Harrison said. "This is real and it's possible and the technology is pushing the envelope, but this is real and it can happen and it will happen. It will change the way we travel."