Vande Bharat Express to get new features

Indian Railways' premium train Vande Bharat Express is all setto get upgraded features after the Integral Coach Factory (ICF) at Chennai haspublished the tender for supply of electrical equipment and other items.

ICF has got an order from the government to manufacture 44 Trainsets of 16 coaches each, according to a statement issued by the RailwayMinistry. At present 2 Train sets of Vande Bharat Express trains are running inthe Indian Railways network. However, later it was found out that the Trainsets consume more power than the global standards.

The new Train sets of the Vande Bharat Express will be able toreach the speed of 160 km/h in just 140 seconds. It will help in saving of 20%in journey time and all equipment is suitable for flooding conditions.

The new Vande Bharat trains will be manufactured by ensuringthat it meets the changes and recommendations suggested by the Research Designand Standards Organisation (RDSO).

The new Train sets of the Vande Bharat Express trains will comewith improved features like higher acceleration/ deceleration and reduction inturnaround time.

These trainsets will be supplied in multiples of basic units of 4 coaches each which can be attached or detached from the train as per requirement. This will be a major improvement in reliability and operational efficiency as it will be possible to replace basic units in case of defects or augment the train length up to 24 coaches in case of increased demand. The present train sets do not have this feature because of which the entire train set is rendered ineffective in case of any defect in a coach.

Indian Railways have planned to introduce passenger train sets with distributed powering, working on 25000 V single phase 50 Hz OHE system in the new train sets of the Vande Bharat Express according to the statement. This will help in providing the semi high-speed trains with a running speed of 160 km/h.

All coaches in Train set will be Chair Car type for day travel. All the Train sets will be provided with cab AC in DTCs, above roof HT equipment, 25 KV Roof through HT cable assembly with associated accessories like insulators, jumper cables etc, fully air-conditioned passenger compartment with vestibule arrangement, automatic plug doors with retractable footsteps, automatic intercommunication door, PAPIS consisting of in coach displays, speakers, side destination boards etc, luggage racks with reading lamps, direct lighting (for passengers) and diffused lighting (for luggage racks), continuous LED light fixtures, modular pantry equipments and GPS antenna in all coaches, Mobile/laptop charging sockets in the passenger seats, CCTVs and Emergency talkback units with networking system in all coaches.

The revised specification takes care of the improvements pointedout by Chief Commissioner for Railway Safety in the prototype rake and willprovide more reliable service along with ease of operations and improvedpassenger comfort

The train set interiors will have improved fire safety as per EN 45545 HL2 and improved electrical protection and safety with a well-defined protection scheme for High Voltage roof cable, Automatic fire detection and alarm.

The train set is also provided with explosion-proof, lightweight lithium-iron-phosphate batteries specified to provide back up for the duration of 3 hours, state of the art aluminium body roof-mounted packaged unit (RMPU) type air-conditioning units with thermal comfort based Microprocessor controller. The peak efficiency of the propulsion system of these train sets will not be less than 87% which provides for a more robust, efficient and reliable system.