Vande Bharat sleeper will be much better than Rajdhani Express trains in terms of speed and ride comfort, says U Subba Rao, General Manager of Indian Railways’ Integral Coach Factory (ICF) in Chennai. In an interview with Times of India Online’s Smriti Jain, Rao shares the latest update on the Vande Bharat sleeper train, the production pipeline for Vande Bharat, NaMo Bharat and Amrit Bharat trains. Edited excerpts:
What is the status of the Vande Bharat sleeper train and how is the new train different from Rajdhani Express?
Vande Bharat sleeper is a sleeper version of the Vande Bharat. We are going to produce a total 10 of these trains which will be 16 coach long. We are producing this in collaboration with BEML and the first prototype rake has already been dispatched from ICF after modifications & corrections for conducting field trials.
An oscillation trial was conducted between Mahoba and Khajuraho section of North Central Railway at a maximum test speed of 115 kmph. Further detailed oscillation trial run at maximum speed of 180 kmph was conducted between Nagda, Kota and Sawai Madhopur section of West Central Railway.
A lot of extensive trials and tests for the emergency braking system and electrical functioning tests were conducted for riding comfort. The train has been tested at 180 kmph and the operational speed will be 160 kmph. I expect that in this fiscal year the train will be ready for its journey.
In terms of comparison with Rajdhani Express trains, the riding comfort will be much better. It will be faster, it has a potential to travel at 160 kmph, and Vande Bharat trains have faster acceleration and deceleration so it picks up speed very fast. In the same section, the average speed of Vande Bharat train will be much higher than any other train.
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The interiors, furnishings are much better, they are really up to the mark. Many more passenger friendly features are there, so that’s how it will be different from Rajdhani Express trains.
This train has 16 coaches right now and the route will be decided by the Railway Board. We have also got orders for 24 car length trains which ICF will be manufacturing,
The first tranche of 16 coach trains will be manufactured by BEML and later on ICF will be manufacturing the 24 coach length trains, and that will take 2 years from now for the first prototype to come out.
U Subba Rao, GM, ICF Chennai
What’s the update on NaMo Bharat trains, also called Vande Metro?
NaMo Bharat trains are fully air-conditioned with one toilet per coach which is basically for day travel. The first rake was a prototype. We don’t have anything in the production pipeline as of now, but we have got orders for 7 more trains. We have already floated tenders for propulsion systems. My estimate is that in the next financial year these 7 trains will be produced.
How many more Vande Bharat trains are in the pipeline?
We have so far produced 81 trains of version 2. Earlier two rakes of Version 1 were rolled out in 2018 and 2019. We have got an order for a total of 97 trains, my estimate is that this year we will be able to produce 6 more trains.
We were rolling out 8 car trains but because of the popularity of Vande Bharat, we have been asked to produce longer 20 car trains now. That is the reason there is a slight delay in rolling out new Vande Bharat trains, however the coach production number remains on track though.
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Indian Railways is looking to manufacture its first bullet train. Tell us about the high-speed train project
The new high-speed trains will be of the same standard as bullet trains. The definition of a high speed train is beyond 250 kmph – the aerodynamics change at that speed – noise insulation is important at that speed. There are a lot of technical issues involved. We are looking to invite technology bottoms up.
ICF will be working with BEML for production of two 8 car bullet trains. The new standard gauge bullet train will be tested on the Ahmedabad-Mumbai bullet train corridor route.
In the future a lot of high-speed rail corridors may come up in India, so Indian Railways is trying to be future ready. The modalities of how to make the train are yet to be worked out. These will be 8 coach AC chair car trains.
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Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw has said that 50 new Amrit Bharat trains will be manufactured…
We have an order for 50 Amrit Bharat trains, 25 of these will be manufactured by ICF and 25 by RCF Kapurthala. These are 22 coach trains and there will be a pantry car as well with a mix of general and second class coaches.
We are targeting 6 Amrit Bharat trains this fiscal year which will be improved versions of the prototypes that were launched earlier. RCF is also likely to roll out some Amrit Bharat trains this fiscal year.
