New Train 18/Vande Bharat Exp. must excel its ancestor!

 

The euphoria that we at Integral Coach factory, Chennai (ICF) lived through on the day of the unveiling of Train 18, on the day it breached the 180 km/h speed in tests with all parameters well within the safe limits and on the day it was launched in commercial service by the PM was so sublime that at is almost untellable. Team ICF had delivered the first modern train entirely of Indian origin from concept to design to engineering to manufacture at much less than half the cost of import. We had gradually realized that ICF was doing something great but the way the country loved the complete Make in India concept of the project, the way they celebrated it as something of their own and the phenomenal coverage it got was beyond our imagination. It made every ICF member feel very happy, proud and also grateful to each and every member of the team, everyone who supported it and even those who opposed it because they all had some contribution in this success.

Imagine, it was just a train. Thank people for big mercies. 

 

The two trains have been running successfully for nearly three years without many hitches, a feat not paralleled by even any imported rolling stock so far. 

 

We have gone through all this many times over. That the team was later hounded through the age-old poisonous instrument of that special Indian species of scoundrels, “give a dog a bad name and hang him”, is a thing of the past, albeit a painful nightmare for us. Shining success of the train and the team which built it, and the pride thereof, has been restored, after it went through a rigmarole of crooked machinations with vilification of the train and witch-hunt of the team members. Not every one of the team has been revived but be that as it may, it is time to look at the future dispassionately.

 

As of today, with many changes right from the top down to the executives at ICF and with two of the top contributors in development of Train 18 back at the helm, the vibes have not been as healthy since early 2019 when all the nefarious negativity was started. The PM has been announcing a great future for Vande Bharat trains, including the latest announcement on 15^th August last year of 75 such trains in 75 weeks, fashioning it as a symbol of aspirational India. Indian Railways have already unfolded a plan for 104 such trains, with equipment ordered, or under order, for 44 trains and procurement action underway for 58 more. There is certain extent of hype in all the announcements but I am not quibbling about that; the future does appear to be bright for the train and although we would certainly miss the targets being spieled around but that is not more than a pin prick.

 

We did build a great train but was it a world-class? Not quite. We wanted to but we were running against time as we were trying to do something in 18 months against the word-wide norm of 36 to 42 months. Now is the time to look at it very closely to turn out Train 18s (or rather Train 22s as the third rake should reportedly be out in May’ 22) which must be necessarily be an improvement over the first two.

 

What would be my recipe for the new trains?

 

New specification? Let us get this bizarre creation out of the way. I have always said, and we now know, that the so-called development of new specification was nothing but an exercise driven by pure jealousy, venal mindset and unadulterated insipidity. That it attempts to enhance the acceleration of a train which was at the optimum already or improve the ride index of a train which is acknowledged to have a ride-comfort superior to existing coaches is clear but the die was already cast; these ‘boil the ocean’ modifications would neither cut down travel time nor improve perceptible passenger experience. One can only hope that these hair-brained modifications do not come in way of proliferation of the trains due to some unnecessary complication arising out of them, given that these changes have already set back the project by three years.

 

As far as I know, there are not many technical issues to be addressed but, even those there are, should be addressed strongly, like the ventilation of traction motors which gather lot of dust today, reducing the periodicity of their maintenance, cable layout not very friendly for maintenance, disuse of Stepper in the Plug door due to incompatibility with platform height etc. By the way, I understand the Stepper in the Plug Door is being eliminated; that would be a defeatist way to solve a problem, giving up a passenger-friendly feature.

 

Based on the limited feedback I have from the initial runs of the train before I retired and later from the postings on social media, I would recommend the following changes:

 

The slide-forward type seats, as used in Europe widely, were not appreciated by our travelling public and we should provide back-rest reclining type seats, given that the integrity of the snack table would be maintained unlike our Shatabdis in which these tables become rickety.

There were complaints of inadequate storage or holding space for catering and it needs to be augmented.

The so-called improved specification has eliminated the Passenger Information System (PIS), which seems like the work of some exceptional RDSO worthy. This unique facet should not be given up. Yes, the aesthetics need improvement, e.g., the LCD screens fitted next to the intercompartmental doors should be improved to make them flush with the panel.

I believe another RDSO worthy has added an ugly emergency widow like LHB coaches; never mind  that no one has ever used this monstrosity on our coaches so far. Can we not think of a more organized evacuation of passengers in an accident? In any case, I hope the continuous window look of the train is not spoilt by unimaginative babudom.

The touch type reading lights integrated in the luggage rack did not work very well although procured from a very good source. This would need modification.

The fire sampling points have to be incorporated in a more pleasing manner as they present a discordant appearance today.

Uneven gaps in the panelling should be reduced to improve the looks of the interiors, this may need tightening the tolerances of shell manufacture too.

The rubber flooring in the first two rakes were of good quality but not suited for a train in which passengers bring heavy luggage. The flooring type needs to be improved. Although an improved version of PVC would be the easier and cheaper option, I would think that a more pleasing flooring should be employed.

The toughened window glass used in earlier rakes shatter when some miscreants throw stones on the train; considering our environment, suitable shatter-proof laminated glass should be used.

I know about the frequent damage to the nose of the train due to cattle run over cases. I cannot think of any solution as no nose, howsoever strong, can withstand the impact when a large animal is hit at a high speed; the Hobson’s choice, therefore, is to attend and replace cone sections to maintain the aesthetics and functioning of this USP of the train unlike the ugly patch repair that we do today. As for a Cattle Guard in front, it would spoil the looks of the train front totally and, therefore, I absolutely disfavour it. In the long run, all higher speed train set routes will have to be fenced or freed of cattle menace through other means.

 

There is another important aspect which should not be lost sight of. Vande Bharat express rakes should be based initially in a maximum of three base depots and assigning one or two rakes to a depot should be avoided. There has been a lot of learnings in running and maintaining the two rakes on Northern Railway and it should be consolidated and passed on to only a couple of other well-established depots or all this benefit of experience would be frittered away

 

As for the future in respect of new avatars of Train 18, the following stand out and I christen them as cousins of Train 18,  because this name, Train 18, had the magic which propelled the ICF team into unprecedented action back in 2017.

 

Train 23:

 

Assuming we would have 104 rakes in, say, five years from now, on which services would we deploy these rakes? Shatabdis or Shatabdi-type trains are clear candidates but that would mean only about 30 rakes. It follows that development of a Sleeper version is a must to replace conventional rakes of Rajdhanis. We had planned that in 2018 as Train 19 project but it was sent into limbo after early 2019. I have been advocating that ICF start work on a prototype to be turned out by end 2022 as Train 22 but that seems unlikely. Can ICF not wok strongly on this and realize it as Train 23 by early 2023?

 

Train 25:

 

Train 20 was planned as a future-ready rolling stock for speed range 160 to 200 km/h operation, operation in this speed range may become a reality on IR although the prospects appear bleak as the works for 160 km/h fitness of infrastructure is nowhere near completion. In any case, migration from 160 km/h to 200 km/h is not such a complicated journey. The Train 20 project called for an Aluminium-bodied train set with improved features to make it compatible with third party equipment of advanced signalling. To minimise expenditure on track and allied infrastructure it should be provided with Pendolino type tilting mechanism too. It should be possible to move a project for, say, 500 coaches or 30 train sets, on the model made by ICF in 2018, which envisaged a partnership in design and manufacture and not the IR’s conventional ToT regime, with shed space being made available to the manufacturing partner at ICF. This model would equip ICF to be ready for design and manufacture of medium-high-speed trains entirely on their own in future. With  a sense of purpose detached from hype, it should be possible to have a Train 25 running on IR by 2025. But for that, we must act now.

 

Well, as I end this piece, I am remined of Portia in the bard’s The Merchant of Venice, saying, “If to do were as easy as to know what were good to do, chapels had been churches and poor men’s cottages princes' palaces.”. At the same time, team ICF has shown in the past that with a determined leadership and a motivated team, "Wishes can indeed be horses”.

 

I wish and hope they are.