Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Vips »

Here's a look at the minds behind the indigenously built Train 18.

Every evening, Manish Pradhan plays squash at Integral Coach Factory’s officers club in Chennai. After a day of hard work at the railway workshop, the 50-year-old engineer finds the game a stressbuster and often out-manoeuvers opponents. But till recently, he faced a challenger.

Playing with Sudhanshu Mani, the factory’s former boss, was always difficult even though he was 10 years older, Pradhan recalls. In the court, as they alternately tackled the ball, Mani would ask Pradhan about the progress made during the day in the Train 18 project, the semi-high speed world-class train set being designed by a team of 300 people.

Then the matches stopped. Mani retired on December 31 last year, packed his luggage and left for Lucknow — his hometown — the very next day.

Rebuilding Brand ICF

Integral Coach Factory, spread over 473 acres in the seaside city, was set up eight years after Independence and has rolled out more than 60,000 rail coaches. But of late, the coaches were not considered modern enough for the elite Rajdhani or Shatabdi trains. So from last year, ICF stopped producing those “outdated” coaches — also known as ICF coaches — and started manufacturing only the state-of-the-art Linke Hofmann Busch(LHB)coaches that are part of Rajdhani and Shatabdi.

But Mani wanted ICF to do more. Soon after taking over as ICF’s general manager in August 2016, he started to look at ways to rebuild the factorys tattered image.

Image

He found the answer in Train 18.

From concept stage in November 2016 and getting the go-ahead in April 2017, the train set was designed and manufactured in 18 months flat.
Today, it is undergoing trial runs, and waiting for its maiden journey from Delhi to Varanasi — the Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s constituency.

Political observers say the PM flagging off the train during Kumbh Mela in Prayagraj will drive home the point of the government’s developmental agenda.

The train set has no separate engine; motors are placed under eight of the 16 coaches and during trial, it ran at 180 km per hour. The ICF, however, fixed the maximum operational speed of the trainset at 160 km/h. But covering the 780-km Delhi to Varanasi stretch with one train set will be a stretch, says an official in the railway ministry on the condition of anonymity. “Ideally, we should have two train sets for covering such a distance,” he said.

But the second set is still being built at ICF workshop. The same train set will have to travel to and fro (a return journey of 16 hours) every day and any technical snag can disrupt the service.

High-tech, home-made
Built at a cost of only Rs 97 crore per piece, Train 18 resembles any aesthetically designed European transporter — tap lights, reading lights, app-based audio-visual entertainment, aircraft-like vacuum toilets and revolving chairs in business class.

For Indian Railways, Train 18 has become a signature product and usually exceeds the expectations of anyone who climbs onboard, which makes one wonder: how could the same engineers, who made the now-discarded ICF coaches, create this marvel?

To find the answer, this writer first reviewed the Train 18 prototype at New Delhi Railway Station earlier this month and then visited ICF in chennai where the next two rakes are being built.

Image

We could do it because we were empowered to take decisions,” says Pradhan. Some of the daily decisions with no financial implications were taken on the spot by using a WhatsApp group rather than resorting to red-taped files, he says.

There were instances of allowing one vendor tenders for specialised components. And where a file was seen as indispensable, a small yellow paper was pasted on it to indicate it was a Train 18 file, implying no official should delay it.

“All Train 18 files were treated as highspeed ones!” says KN Babu, who served as Mani’s secretary.

From the time the project was conceived, a sense of urgency was embedded into it. As the name of the train suggests, it had to be rolled out by 2018.

There was some resistance in the Railway Board in granting us the approval. But then chairman AK Mittal ruled it in our favour in April 2017. Usually, a project of this magnitude would have taken three and half years, but we did it in 18 months,” Mani told ET Magazine on phone from Lucknow.

Mani’s team members say his management mantra was simple: Get the right people and empower them.

One of them is Shubhranshu. “I was posted in Mumbai when I received a call from Mani explaining how he was planning to build a world-class train set. We knew each other well and even thought alike,” he says. Soon, Shubhranshu (he uses only one name) joined ICF as principal chief mechanical engineer, the number two in the coveted train project.

Like Mani, who skipped a metallurgical engineering course at IIT Kanpur to do mechanical engineering at Indian Railways Institute of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering, Shubhranshu too dropped out of IIT Kharagpur after three semesters and joined the same institute. He is now in charge of rolling out two more Train 18 sets by March 31 and eight in the next financial year.

Once more sets are ready, Train 18 may be deployed on several other key routes such as Delhi-Jaipur, Delhi-Chandigarh and Delhi-Bhopal, officials in the know say.

Besides Mani and Shubhranshu, two other officers, who played critical roles in the Train 18 project, are Debi Prasad Dash (55) and S Srinivas (54).
As chief design engineer-electrical, Dash spearheaded a small team of nine designers to ensure Train 18’s several electrical feats, including the much talked-about high pickup — covering six km in just 182 seconds.

Srinivas, the chief design engineer-mechanical, on the other hand, led a team of 50 engineers who designed separate components simultaneously. And the last but not the least is Pradhan, in-charge of the train’s interior — an aspect considered critical for brand Train 18.

But Mani’s men aren’t so happy. First, they miss Mani. At a tearful farewell, one employee presented Mani a caricature of him, his journalist wife Anupama and son Sarang, who is studying computer engineering in the US. Second, their dream of Train 20, a train set with aluminium body that Mani had conceived and wanted to roll out in 2020, seems impractical now, since the Railway Board has not yet given it a green signal (The bloddy b a s t a r d s also tried to delay/sabotage Train18) . “If not Train 20, we’ll go for a Train 21 or Train 22.

Minds behind the Machine

Sudhanshu Mani, 60, former general manager, ICF
Image

Role: Conceived the idea of the train set, secured Railway Board’s approval and built it in a record 18 months
Passionate about: Art collection

Son of a railway officer, Mani was selected for metallurgical engineering at IIT Kanpur. But the Lucknow boy chose to do a mechanical
engineering from the Indian Railways Institute of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering in Jamalpur, Bihar.
His nine years at Railways’
Research Design and Standard Organisation (RDSO) helped him conceive a state-of-the-art transporter like Train 18. Mani retired as a general manager on December 31.

Shubhranshu, 55, principal chief mechanical engineer, ICF
Image

Role: Execution of the project and timely delivery

Passionate about: Reading and billiards
A cadre of the Indian Railway Service of Mechanical Engineers (IRSME), he joined the railways in 1985. Hailing from Patna, Shubhranshu travelled extensively in Europe and the United States for training and technical collaboration. Besides supervising the rollout of Train 18, he looks after Integral Coach Factory’s export venture — shipping trains and coaches to Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and some African countries.

Debi Prasad Dash, 55, chief design engineer-electrical
Image

Passionate about: Yoga and teaching in schools

Role: Execution of the project and timely delivery

Passionate about: Yoga and teaching in schools
Dash is a 1987-batch officer of the Indian Railway Service of Electrical Engineers (IRSEE). The native of Odisha’s Jaspur district can speak fluent Tamil given his 23-year stint in Tamil Nadu. He and his team of nine electrical designers ensured Train 18’s high pickup: touching a speed of 160 km per hour in just 182 seconds.

S Srinivas, 54, chief design engineer mechanical
Image

Role: Led a team of 50 engineers to design the train’s various parts

Passionate about: Playing golf
A 1986-batch IRSME officer, Srinivas, who is from Vijayawada in Andhra Pradesh, was first posted in Assam. A masters in mechanical engineering from IIT Kharagpur, his seven-year innings at RDSO gave him enough exposure on high-end train technology. His team is presently working on a design of a Train 18 variant for the Rajdhani Express.

Manish Pradhan, 50, chief workshop engineer-furnishing
Image
Role: Workshop management and train’s internal furnishing

Passionate about: Playing squash
A cadre of the IRSME’s 1991 batch, Pradhan is from Gwalior in Madhya Pradesh. Before joining the railways, he did short stints in two state-run companies — NTPC and ONGC. Pradhan is currently handholding workshop supervisors for manufacturing the second and third sets of Train 18
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by hanumadu »

https://mumbaimirror.indiatimes.com/mum ... 533389.cms

Click the link to read it as the website does allow you to copy.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Mollick.R »

Good news for train passengers! Indian Railways links locomotives via ISRO satellites
New Delhi: Good news for train passengers: the Indian Railways has linked its locomotives via ISRO satellites, making it easy to track trains and automatically feed the control charts about the train's arrival and departure, officials said.
"A new beginning has been made in the new year: the train movement information is acquired and fed to the control charts using ISRO (Indian Space Research Organisation) satellite-based real-time train information system (RTIS) automatically," a senior railway ministry official told IANS.
The official said the new system will help railways to modernise its control room, railway network for more efficient train movement across its network.

The official said, "The move is aimed at further improving the accuracy of train-running information."
Explaining how the new system works, the official said the RTIS device installed in the locomotive detects position and speed of the train using GAGAN geo-positioning system, developed by ISRO.

"Based on this information and application logic, the device sends the train movement updates (arrival/departure/run through/unscheduled stoppages and mid-section updates) to a central location server in the CRIS data centre using S-band Mobile Satellite Service (MSS) of ISRO," he said.

After processing in the CLS, this information is relayed to the Control Office Application (COA) system for automatic plotting of control charts without any manual intervention in the divisions," he said.

The official said that earlier, the train running status used to be updated manually. "Before this technique was developed by the CRIS (Centre for Railway Information System) in collaboration with ISRO, the divisional controls set up for the purpose of train movement control were dependent on the information relayed by the station master to the station controller and the data was fed in the control chart by the section controller manually," he said.
He said the COA is being already integrated with National Train Enquiry System (NTES).
Earlier while Working on a pilot project with ISRO, the railways installed space agency-developed integrated circuit (IC) chips on some train locomotives.

"The Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System was used to warn road users of approaching trains through hooters installed at unmanned road crossings,"
https://www.timesnownews.com/amp/busine ... tes/348583
Last edited by Mollick.R on 17 Jan 2019 13:09, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by A Nandy »

https://swarajyamag.com/infrastructure/ ... es-at-once
The foundation stone for the bridge was laid by the then prime minister H D Deve Gowda in January 1997, but construction did not begin until five years later (in 2002) when prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee inaugurated the construction works. Work went on until 2004, but after the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) came to power, construction work again suffered due to lack of funds and attention.

Ultimately, after repeated urgings by the Assam government and threats of stir by many organisations, prime minister Manmohan Singh granted it a ‘national project’ status in 2007.
Guillotining for high treason, that's all these congi crooks deserve.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Singha »

the annual budget allocations were like a trickle. so work also was at snails pace. every year a token sum as given in railway budget
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by vsunder »

Stone throwing at trains also happens in the US. The Train 188 Amtrak derailment at the Frankford curve outside Philadelphia on May 12, 2015 is in part due to stone throwing. There were 8 fatalities, 200 injuries, 11 critically. In 1943 a train derailment occurred at almost the same spot with many dead. The failure of the US Congress to enforce PTC (Positive Train Control) throughout the US is also in part to blame for this accident. Three years later Congress has not moved fully and there is still a tussle with the FTC(Federal Trade Commission) to release frequencies to operate necessary RF equipment needed for PTC. The events leading up to this tragedy are:

A SEPTA train(South east Pennsylvania Transit Authority) commuter train was stopped on the tracks as someone had thrown a rock through the windshield of the driver's cab. The loco pilot had glass all over him and was cut and bleeding. The Amtrak train was behind the SEPTA train on another line and headed from Washington DC to New York. The loco pilot Brandon Bostian was keyed into the radio chatter between the section controller and the SEPTA driver and knew the train was stopped and there would be emergency crew at work so he had slowed down but following the chatter. A little bit beyond where the SEPTA train was stopped, lies the infamous Frankford curve. Here there is a mandatory speed limit of 50mph. Bostian lost situational awareness ( as per the findings of the NTSB Board of inquiry) and once having passed the SEPTA train, increased the speed to 106 mph, too late he realized he was on the curve. He tried to slow down and at that point it was too late and the train ran off the tracks. If PTC had been in operation, it would have detected the increase in speed and applied the brakes or warned the driver.

Congress had mandated all railroad companies to install PTC devices by 2015. The deadline was then extended to 2018 and now once again to 2022. Generally there are several issues with wireless control and Train protection devices and companies are reluctant to hand control over to devices when there is a skilled operator on board. Sudden application of emergency brakes can cause a train to derail and wireless based systems have not been perfected where they are foolproof. More or less PTC is now available on the Northeast corridor in the US.

What worries me is that with increased speeds on the DFC, there is the possibility of tanker cars derailing. Though it is an article of faith in the industry that crude oil does not explode, the famous Lac Megantic episode in Quebec, Canada 6th July 2013, is an eye opener. The cataclysmic explosions were captured from space, the town was leveled and not re-built. This was due to improper actions of the loco pilot that caused this tanker train to derail where the crude had a high content of butane and propane leading to a massive conflagration. IR should start conducting crash tests on tankers and making sure they can survive derailments or else a catastrophe if it happens in a densely packed town in Gangetic Uttar Pradesh would be a thousand times worse than what happened in Lac Megantic.

Video of the Lac Megantic disaster:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yAja2PhgFI0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVMNspPc8Zc

Note, the speed at which the Lac Megantic derailment occurred is 100kmph which is the top speed of the DFC. It does not take much even with good tracks, just a bearing running hot and wheels locking and bang you are in trouble.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Singha »

^ why does the train driver say it was secure when he left. did a parked train somehow start rolling unmanned?

in any case seems most trains in US/EU have only 1 driver? in india 2 are on all trains except shunting trains.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Zynda »

At least in US & Canada, there are two individuals in the loco cab...one engineer & the other one conductor.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Supratik »

New Janshatabdi train.

https://youtu.be/pYbZ38jUH58
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Jayram »

A Nandy wrote:https://swarajyamag.com/infrastructure/ ... es-at-once
The foundation stone for the bridge was laid by the then prime minister H D Deve Gowda in January 1997, but construction did not begin until five years later (in 2002) when prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee inaugurated the construction works. Work went on until 2004, but after the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) came to power, construction work again suffered due to lack of funds and attention.

Ultimately, after repeated urgings by the Assam government and threats of stir by many organisations, prime minister Manmohan Singh granted it a ‘national project’ status in 2007.
Guillotining for high treason, that's all these congi crooks deserve.
So could they have stopped sending money to essential infra and siphoned money off for themselves? Seems like a likely MO. What else would explain the lack of funding towards an allocated project i.e a official line item in the govts budget. I get that when govts change the priorities change but there should be accountability for wasting tax payer money. And people should hold govts accountable for this kind of on/off allocation.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Singha »

There are always competing line items for limitwd govt funds

Upa was busy squandering money on social justice schemes to secure its vote banks
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Aditya_V »

Singha wrote:There are always competing line items for limitwd govt funds

Upa was busy squandering money on social justice schemes to secure its vote banks
Big myth, money never reached the bottom, they only spent on thier C system to enrich themselves and make sure thier election machinery has cash.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by nash »

Number of countries express interest to import Train 18 set, reveal senior rail officials

Read more at:
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/in ... 591080.cms
Its a 200 billion $ market, it can be helpful to scale up the production and will bring down the cost further.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by rajkumar »

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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Supratik »

Railways considering private train operations. Good move.

https://www.tribuneindia.com/news/natio ... 15755.html
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Rahul M »

the obvious problem with it is the profit making parts will be taken over by pvt. operators while the loss making ones(tracks and mass passenger) will be left with IR, squeezing their finances further. Everyone says privatisation is a good thing or IR, I am yet to see a cogent case stating how it is so.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Karthik S »

Railways in UK is a classic example of why privatization will not lead to better running of railways. With good governance, it has been shown that anything related to public infra can be built and run efficiently. No need to disrupt that now.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Kashi »

I share the concerns of Rahul M, pvt players will go for the juicy Golden Quadrilateral routes, leaving IR holding the chaff.

On a different note, will the trains on DFCC be privately run?
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Singha »

I imagine the french railways, spain and japan are govt run? seems to work well for them.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Rahul M »

when people talk of pvt. of IR in India the model is very similar to what exists in the UK, govt. maintaining the tracks and infrastructure while pvt companies operate the trains.
the british rail is an example of a nationalised rail that was slowly privatised. it appears that the aam brit isn't particularly happy about it, cost wise it is quite a bit more expensive than its european counterparts.
this report goes into some of the issues that we might face in the future.


one point that immediately strikes me is that a public service like rail will need significant amounts of public funding for both expansion & maintenance. how would the govt of the day justify that spending when the fruits of that funding would be reaped by the pvt. operators ? it would be a huge political hot potato.
also, any profit railway makes needs to be invested into developing it further, rather than be skimmed off the top like a normal business.

what we actually need is pvt. efficiency but public ownership, perhaps pvt. management with govt. ownership is the way to go ?
some steps IR is already doing, like handing off non operational functions like catering & cleaning to pvt entities.
more can be done, like contracting out track, engine & rolling stock maintenance.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Kashi »

Singha wrote:I imagine the french railways, spain and japan are govt run? seems to work well for them.
Japan National Railways were privatised in 1987. They also have a huge network of privately owned railways, dating back to 1910s. Subway systems (Tokyo Metro, Osaka Metro etc.) are mostly publicly owned.
Rahul M wrote:what we actually need is pvt. efficiency but public ownership, perhaps pvt. management with govt. ownership is the way to go ?
That's exactly the model followed in Japan and Germany. For example Deustch Bahn is a private company owned by FRG government. Likewise, Tokyo Metro is a private company "jointly owned by the Japanese government and the Tokyo metropolitan government."

Germany provides a rail subsidy of 17 billion euros a year (as of 2014), France provides 13.2 billion Euros a year (as of 2014). So even private efficiency doesn't really guarantee profitability.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by vsunder »

Kashi wrote:I share the concerns of Rahul M, pvt players will go for the juicy Golden Quadrilateral routes, leaving IR holding the chaff.

On a different note, will the trains on DFCC be privately run?
I believe you know Hindi. Please look at the youtube video above I have linked on inauguration of the 306km new WDFC line. It starts with news reporters posing questions in Hindi to DFC MD Sachan. The last question taken by MD Sachan is exactly this: on privatization of DFC. After that the video cuts to Bharat Mata ki jai and the loco is flagged off. Sachan states there is no barrier to privatization and that is within the mandate of the DFC.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by vsunder »

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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Supratik »

Rahul, I share your concern but it is most likely going to be run like many of the new airports i.e. private-public partnership. Govt will own the infra and charge private operators for running the trains. It is going to raise ticket prices but Indians should decide whether they want cheap socialist infra with the third rate efficiency or first world infra at a higher price. Right now they are not complaining about Del or Mum or other airports which are now world class but pricey. Even lines of Mum metro and now Del metro are being privatized. Similar things will happen with railway stations which are being handed over to the private sector for redevelopment. Indians should decide whether they want third world stations that smell of urine and feces or first world stations for a higher price. As for profitability of IR the premium segment is a small portion of their network. Eventually IR has to move out of many mass third class trains that it runs as the highway and expressway systems improve and poor commuters can move to bus journeys. There will be still be many sectors that will still need govt subsidy like the Udan scheme for airlines.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Supratik »

To add in premium trains on IR network the only segment where IIRC they make a profit is in 3AC. I think they make a loss in both 2AC and 1AC. Not sure of sleepers. But the other segments are mainly loss making. This is made up by overcharging the freight sector. IIRC India has one of the highest rail cargo transportation costs per its economy. This distortion is due to the belief that other sectors must subsidize the poor travelling by train. In the end it helps practically no one. IR has to restructure its role as India moves forward to an economy where most people are middle class and can afford train travel in first world conditions. Plus, due to ugly state of IR you will find very few tourists availing train travel in India which is routine in developed countries. This situation will not change with stasis.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Singha »

1AC most of the coaches are ancient. priced high that cannot compete with airlines. mostly govt babus, railway officials and mantris/tantris rule the roost in the limited 1AC coaches. I had travelled once overnight a decade ago in 1AC and very disappointed nothing had changed in 20 years wrt 1AC. it was a good quiet place to sleep thats all.

cheesy 50s era EU fittings. this was in 2017, and other than the side ladder nothing had changed from 1986 when i used it howrah to chennai. then we used to have a proper ladder in each room.

my father on his extensive bank travels used to love 1AC over flying :lol: he used to come home and brag about the comfort levels, the room service food, the bed tea served, the cutlets, the continental food and so on. sophisticated people travelling on 1AC/rajdhani in that era used to order continental over desi(a couple of bits of mutton skin floating in a red oily curry)...conti used to some chicken pieces in a white sauce - white > red > black so more tfta.

those days they used to rope off the platform in howrah where rajdhani would depart, with thick velvet ropes....and only most senior and polished TTE were on it - saw it myself.

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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by souravB »

Probably the first model they would adopt is attaching few private coaches to existing trains.
Supratik wrote:Eventually IR has to move out of many mass third class trains that it runs as the highway and expressway systems improve and poor commuters can move to bus journeys. There will be still be many sectors that will still need govt subsidy like the Udan scheme for airlines.
Gov can do both with a vision, long term planning and innovative ideas. For eg. take the case of DD sleeper cars, it is a firm belief embedded in babudom as well as many people that it will decrease comfort. But it will also increase passenger carriage capacity. the lower deck can have our traditional 3-Tier/AC config and the upper deck can have modern 2AC and 1AC sleeper configs with as much luxury one can afford. Yes the poorer section of the society would be travelling in a lesser comfortable coach but with designs the lessening of comfort could be mitigated. Having more number of profitable coaches will increase the earnings of IR. Proper designs and clever innovations like sleeper chairs, small private cubicles like in Etihad business class for single passengers can increase competitiveness.
People may argue that as we move towards middle income society, flying would be better option. It would have been better option if we were not going to be the most populous country by 2050. 1 DD train can ferry 5 times of what an A380 can with less and cleaner energy.
A long term planning to improve signalling, increasing electric pole height for higher DD trains, boundary walls in urban areas, removal of all level crossings and movement of IR towards a PSU unit would be revolutionary.
Also there are many things that IR can privatize. IRCTC is PPP in name and is a gov org. Break it into zones or regions and auction it to private players. Increase competition.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Singha »

>> A long term planning to improve signalling, increasing electric pole height for higher DD trains, boundary walls in urban areas

all of this is already funded and work in progress. double stack containers will come. amritsar tragedy + semi HSR plans goaded the funding of walls on urgent basis.

>> removal of all level crossings

all unmanned level crossings are almost gone. some of the manned ones are uneconomical to build flyovers on and some in very congested urban areas nothing can be done. in any case , so long as they work, they dont slow down trains, only road traffic.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Supratik »

They need to upgrade all services over a period of 20 years e.g. T-18 instead of LHB Shatabdi, Mumbai AC local, LHB rakes instead of ICF rakes etc. That will automatically do away with a lot of unviable things that the IR does and makes losses on. Closing down unviable operations may not be politically doable.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Singha »

by january end all unmanned level crossings will be gone.

https://www.financialexpress.com/infras ... d/1450244/

According to the Railway Ministry, starting from April 2017, the number of unmanned level crossings on broad gauge routes have been reduced to a great extent. In the month of April 2017, there were as many as 4,943 unmanned level crossings on broad gauge routes. One year later, the number of such crossings was reduced to 3,479 by April last year. By November 2018, the number of such crossings was further reduced to 77 and by December 2018, only 1 unmanned level crossing was left, which will be done away with before the month of January comes to an end, Indian Railways said.

As per the information shared by the Railway Ministry, as many as 65 railway accidents were caused due to unmanned level crossings across the country in the year 2009-2010, 48 accidents in 2010-2011, 54 accidents in 2011-2012, 53 accidents in 2012-2013, 47 accidents in 2013-2014, 50 accidents in 2014-2015, 29 accidents in 2015-2016, 20 accidents in 2016-2017, 10 accidents in 2017-2018 and 3 accidents in 2018-2019.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Theo_Fidel »

The train 18 looks like a nice initiative. But it is still just the basic first step. Need to keep R/D investment cycles going and not have it collapse like Skybus. I suspect you need about 3-4 iterations before a world quality trainset becomes available.

It looks like the cost is Rs 100 Crore pre 16 coach set. About $1 Million per coach. China’s prices are in the $1.2-1.5 million range per coach all in. So it will be very competitive if they do the R/D to hold costs down.

A few items….
- The chairs need to swill to adjust with direction of travel. Comfort/safety.
- Has that front nose been aerodynamically tested? It doesn’t look right for a 180 kmph train. Commuter maybe ok.
- The Engineers cabin windows could be larger with laminated glass. Or have cameras to increase engineer visibility.
- The doors and cabin to cabin diaphragms should not be inset as shown. Again it needs to be aerodynamically tested for higher speeds. Ideally smooth skin.
- Why is the undercarriage exposed like that. It need to be covered with a shroud to reduce drag. Maybe next round.
- The build quality needs to improve. This doesn’t look like any capital upgrades have been done in terms of stamping, punching and quality control.
- You just have to walk down the street to the Bharat Benz factory to see how factory quality can be improved. You can eat off the floor there.

Eventually India will have to move to the 250 kmph intercity trainset model upgrading existing tracks.
India needs to move away from sleeper(super-duper expensive) to chair cars for almost all travel. I would nix the sleeper car investment and immediately start the the next iteration chair car with lessons learnt and equipment upgrades.

Every 1-2 hours a train should leave for all the major metros. Every 2-3 hours train to regional metros. For instance there should be a train to Chennai-Bengluru every 1-2 hours and train to Chennai-Madurai every 2-3 hours. Dedicated trainsets. Lot cheaper long term.

Most freight moved to DFC’s.
Local commuter 120 kmph run on Third rail line.
Suburban/Metro separate system.
Katare
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Katare »

Rahul,
IR will make a lot of money from private operations too and private sector will bring it's own capital too for acquiring trainsets and building infrastructure for warehouse etc. If done right like what was done for airports it can bring a lot more efficiency and investment than if IR wereto do it alone.
Katare
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Katare »

So the man who led the miracle of Train-18 was retired and sent home. That is the first thing they did....god help us and IR.
Vips
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Vips »

Remember this is not just about Train 18 but of Train 20/21 (Aluminium Bodied Sleeper Class trains) which will be required in even larger numbers then Train 18. The Babudom has already delayed Train 20/21 in procedural wrangles and will go all out to sabotage it.
The Vendors who supplier sub parts which goes into making of regular ICF coaches will go out of business and will try their best to put an end to Train18 and its aluminium bodied sleeper class version.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Raveen »

Theo_Fidel wrote:

- The chairs need to swill to adjust with direction of travel. Comfort/safety.
- Has that front nose been aerodynamically tested? It doesn’t look right for a 180 kmph train. Commuter maybe ok.

Didn't know you could conduct aero testing by staring at pictures of objects - I will try this technique next time.

Also, here is what swill means:
/swil/
verb
verb: swill; 3rd person present: swills; past tense: swilled; past participle: swilled; gerund or present participle: swilling
1.
British
wash or rinse out (an area or container) by pouring large amounts of water or other liquid over or into it.
"I swilled out the mug"
synonyms:
wash, sluice, clean out, flush, rinse, bathe, cleanse, drench
"with a clatter of buckets and bowls, we started to swill down the yard"
cause (liquid) to swirl around in a container or cavity.
"she gently swilled her brandy around her glass"
(of a liquid) move or splash about over a surface.
"the icy water swilled around us"
2.
informal
drink (something) greedily or in large quantities.
"they whiled away their evening swilling pints of beer"
synonyms:
drink, quaff, swallow, down, gulp down, drain, guzzle, imbibe, sup, slurp, consume; More
informalswig, swill (down), slug, knock back, knock off, toss off, put away, get one's laughing gear round, bend one's elbow;
informalneck;
informalchug, scarf down
"they whiled away their evening swilling pints of beer"
accompany (food) with large quantities of drink.
"a feast swilled down with pints of cider"
noun
noun: swill; plural noun: swills
1.
kitchen refuse and scraps of waste food mixed with water for feeding to pigs.
synonyms:
pigswill, hogwash, pigwash, wash, mash; More
slops, scraps, refuse, scourings, leftovers, waste matter, waste, remains, detritus
"if a regular source of swill is available, pig keeping can be profitable"
informal
alcohol of inferior quality.
"the beer was just warm swill"
2.
informal
a large mouthful of a drink.
"a swill of ale"
synonyms:
gulp, drink, swallow, draft, mouthful;
Last edited by Raveen on 22 Jan 2019 04:12, edited 1 time in total.
chetak
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by chetak »

Katare wrote:So the man who led the miracle of Train-18 was retired and sent home. That is the first thing they did....god help us and IR.
if the GoI doesn't give him a consultants post to continue the same job, some Pvt sector entity will snap him up.

when useless judges and IAS baboo(n)s can be hired post retirement, why not guys like him??
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Singha »

the slightly inset doors are always the case in IR. i have no seen a smooth form fitting door ever maybe its harder to manufacture the hinge mechanism like its used in aircraft needs hydraulic parts to glide in with a finger push and then slot into place just before its entirely closed.

rest of it is passable at 180kmph. for 250k may need wheel shrouds to reduce noise and drag and a more pointy nose , flush doors etc .

engineer cabin may need bulletproof glass panes to counter the effect of a large rock @ 180kmph. the old metal grill bolted outside will work but spoil the looks and night visibility.

as of now the tug of war between 2 depts has been resolved by sending them to another authority for resignature of clearances. no commercial run yet - nearly 1 month lost due to this war.

for 250kmph its equivalent to low end turboprop plane/cessna personal plane speed. so all parts and finishes atleast need to be @ Cessna level which is a step up from the rajdhani/shatabdi "brute force and a good bash" level
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by JTull »

chetak wrote:
Katare wrote:So the man who led the miracle of Train-18 was retired and sent home. That is the first thing they did....god help us and IR.
if the GoI doesn't give him a consultants post to continue the same job, some Pvt sector entity will snap him up.

when useless judges and IAS baboo(n)s can be hired post retirement, why not guys like him??
Nothing wrong with him retiring. It'd be wrong to assume that one guy can perform such a 'miracle' alone. Normal turnover is essential to accord opportunities to younger talent.

Nothing wrong in him being hired by pvt sector either. It shows there are business opportunities for others to profit. And the gentleman to continue earning using his skill. If the scope is big enough then participation of pvt sector will be required anyway.

Nothing wrong with IAS officers becoming a consultants (public or private sector) either. Why waste their experience? I know of many honest, hard-working officers who're contributing immensely. Even NSA is a retiree and he has other such appointments in his department.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Aditya_V »

Remember most of the work will get done by Private sector consultants and Vendors for manufacturing stuff, so it is very important these guys work in the Private sector to bring a team effort with public sector to deliver.
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Re: Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

Post by Singha »

good number of nasa talent must have migrated slowly to spacex and blue origin.
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