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Lovely pic of Karwar railway station on Mangalore to Goa train route during monsoons
vsunder saar can probably answer this...it seems like the Steel mechanical properties required by IR is not available in global market? But the article & SAIL's version seem confusing. If IR has floated global tenders twice, was SAIL excluded from taking part in the tenders? If not, what has prevented SAIL even responded to the tender? In the article, SAIL has said that it has capability to develop the newer steels but is waiting for official (?) request from IR. Doesn't the global tender constitute as an official request?By: Saurabh Kumar | Published: June 28, 2019 12:55:02 PM
Even as the ministries of railways and steel are at loggerheads over the volume and quality of rails being supplied by SAIL — the issue is now before the Cabinet secretary — a study by a technical institute at the University of Illinois has showed that the current tracks manufactured by the PSU are not suitable for the 25-tonne axle load freight operations the transporter wishes to upgrade to beyond 50 kmph.
Also, these rails are not suitable for high-speed (160 kmph) passengers operations.
In fact, the study also shows that the current tracks are not suitable to run freight trains of lower 22.9 tonne axle load, which are currently used by the railways beyond 60 kmph.
SAIL has an exclusive contract to supply rails to the transporter.
The Cabinet secretary, as directed by the Prime Minister’s Office, will be soon holding a meeting of the parties involved to sort the issue. The railways in its 100-day agenda has decided to move to high-speed in at least the Delhi-Mumbai and Delhi-Kolkata routes.
The report has observed, “As a point of comparison, the IR’s 880 Mpa rail is of lower strength than even the standard grade used in the US. As such, given the importance of rail as an asset from both the safety and reliability point of view of IR’s operation of both passenger and freight trains on the same infrastructure (rails), TTT recommends the use of higher strength rails.”
The study was commissioned by the railways (IR) to check the findings of the Research Designs & Standards Organisation, a part of the railways, which has recommended use of 1,080 Mpa rails.
The findings of the Transportation Technology Transfer Technical Report have already been presented to steel ministry officials.
Emails sent to SAIL and the ministries of railways and steel remained unanswered.
A source, requesting not to be named, clarified the plants of SAIL in Bhilai were built to service the railways only and they produce 880 Mpa rails as that is the requirement given by IR. “SAIL has research and development teams which develop new grades. If IR sends a request for higher grade, the firm will be able to upgrade, but that cannot happen overnight,” said the source.
The technical report, however, has recommended to “consider use of 1,080 Mpa rail. The existing IR track structure having a rail section, of 60 kg/m and 880 Mpa tensile strength, is not adequate for 25 tonne axle load operations. Given the current estimates of rail stresses, the use of 1,080 Mpa rail with a minimum rail strength in the range of 880 Mpa provides better coverage against a combination of rail stresses and the potential for rail failures compared with 880 Mpa rail.
“Additionally, the incremental strength increase from 880 Mpa will have disproportionately positive impact on 1,080 Mpa rail’s service life. This specification and procurement decision should be considered in terms of the life cycle cost, but the benefits are likely to justify its worth”.
The tracks used now by IR are not unsafe for both passenger and freight movement albeit at low speeds. However, this dampens the ambition of reducing travel time on the network.
The railways has a meagre 35% share of the freight traffic due to abysmally low speeds of trains moving at an average of 25 kmph. “This leads to inordinate delays. In fact, there is a demand to run freight trains of 22.9 axle load at 75 kmph, but railways cannot allow it,” said a government source.
The other tussle that SAIL and IR are engaged in is adequate supply of rails. Despite the railways requiring 14-17 lakh tonne every year to upgrade its existing tracks and build new ones, supply from SAIL has fallen short. In the last financial year, SAIL supplied 9.85 lakh tonne.
The transporter has floated global tenders twice to procure rails from abroad, but both the attempts failed as the specifications required by the railways were not available, in the process slowing down the process of track renewals — putting in question the passenger safety.
Delhi Bhopal Shatabdi runs at 150kmph + may have even touched 160kmph during its runs. Tons of videos online on this.Zynda wrote:Indian Railways tracks by SAIL not fit for 160 kmph passengers trains operations: US university study
vsunder saar can probably answer this...it seems like the Steel mechanical properties required by IR is not available in global market? But the article & SAIL's version seem confusing. If IR has floated global tenders twice, was SAIL excluded from taking part in the tenders? If not, what has prevented SAIL even responded to the tender? In the article, SAIL has said that it has capability to develop the newer steels but is waiting for official (?) request from IR. Doesn't the global tender constitute as an official request?By: Saurabh Kumar | Published: June 28, 2019 12:55:02 PM
The study was commissioned by the railways (IR) to check the findings of the Research Designs & Standards Organisation, a part of the railways, which has recommended use of 1,080 Mpa rails.
The findings of the Transportation Technology Transfer Technical Report have already been presented to steel ministry officials.
The other tussle that SAIL and IR are engaged in is adequate supply of rails. Despite the railways requiring 14-17 lakh tonne every year to upgrade its existing tracks and build new ones, supply from SAIL has fallen short. In the last financial year, SAIL supplied 9.85 lakh tonne.
The transporter has floated global tenders twice to procure rails from abroad, but both the attempts failed as the specifications required by the railways were not available, in the process slowing down the process of track renewals — putting in question the passenger safety.
Singha wrote:Chetak if you make a road trip on west coast, drive from honnavar on KA coast via jog falls & sagar to sivamoga. very scenic route. visit the bhadra wildlife park. north of honavar is karwar and south is the beautiful giant shiva temple of murudeshwara and the sea+river drive of maravanthe.
IR wants to electrify all tracks in next 2 years - which means drumroll all BG tracks in NE.
38.91% land acquisition done for bullet train project: Piyush Goyal
Replying to a question in Lok Sabha, Railway Minister Piyush Goyal said the land acquisition for the High Speed Rail Project also known as Bullet Train Project is currently underway.
More than four lakh additional berths will be available to passengers everyday from October when the railways will move to a technology which will help it generate power from engines, rather than power cars, for lighting and air-conditioning, senior officials said today. Currently, there are one or two power cars at the end of every train in every LHB rake where the electricity to be supplied to coaches is produced in a diesel generator, known as End on Generation (EOG), officials say.
The new technology, "Head on Generation" (HOG), is used worldwide, by which power supply is tapped from overhead power lines and distributed to train coaches. Officials say by October 2019, over 5,000 coaches of the Indian Railways will operate on the new technology. It will not only enable trains to shed their power cars and make way for more coaches but also save the national transporter more ₹6,000 crore in fuel bills annually, they say.
A power car needs 40 litres of diesel per hour per non-AC coach while an AC coach needs 65-70 litres of diesel per hour. Around three units of electricity is provided by one litre of diesel, so a non-AC coach uses around 120 units of electricity per hour.
The new system, which is eco-friendly, with no air or noise pollution will reduce carbon emissions by 700 MT per year per train, officials said.
"In regular practice, two power cars equipped with Diesel Alternator sets are placed at either ends of the rake run in for example every Shatabdi Express. After we move to the HOG system, there is need of only one power car for standby purpose only.
"Another power car can be removed and replaced with an extra passenger coach without increasing the train length. Once all LHB coaches are on this system, we have calculated an increase of more than four lakh berths everyday through this and thus additional revenue as well," said an official.
After the first rake of the India's fastest train Vande Bharat Express was launched in February on the Delhi-Varanasi route, the second rake of the high-speed train is all set to run on the high-traffic Delhi-Katra route, three days a week from August,
https://www.livemint.com/news/india/sec ... 21184.htmlA Nandy wrote:https://swarajyamag.com/insta/good-news ... next-month
After the first rake of the India's fastest train Vande Bharat Express was launched in February on the Delhi-Varanasi route, the second rake of the high-speed train is all set to run on the high-traffic Delhi-Katra route, three days a week from August,
Pooja Express drops you at JAT around 8:30am.Rishi_Tri wrote:Vande Bharat being run on Delhi - Katra route besides tugging at emotional strings also means real convenience.
A typical trip to Vaishno Devi would be like this - you board Pooja Express around 11 pm from Old Delhi Railway Station. Reach Jammu Tawi around 11-12 am next day morning. Take bus from Jammu Tawi station to Katra that in all probability would spend some time at Jammu Bus stand too. By the time you are deposited at Katra bus stand, it shall be 2 pm in the afternoon. All in all 15 hours - which shall be reduced to 8 hours. This is truly amazing.
I last had darshan of Maa Vaishno Devi in 2009. So things may have changed but not too much from above.
Can't wait for Vande Bharat Express for Katra to start.
Its on again...Railways Introduces New Tender System For ‘Train 18’, 40 Vande Bharat Train Sets To Be Produced Over Next 3 Years
In a bid to introduce a new system that provides all bidders a level playing field and ensuring transparency, the Indian Railways has introduced new tender system for the production of third rake of Train 18 (also called the Vande Bharat Express), The Financial Express reported.
Immediately there was a problemWhile Train 18’s first rake was manufactured in a record time of just 18 months at an estimated cost of around Rs 97 crore, the Railway Ministry received nearly 25 complaints from multinational companies and vendors that a domestic private company was allegedly favoured in the procurement process for the train set’s electrical equipment.
In a bid to help the Indian Railways meet the increasing demand for faster and efficient movement of the freight, the Ministry of Railways has sought Union Cabinet’s approval to build three new dedicated freight corridor (DFC) networks at a total investment of about Rs 3 lakh crore, reports LiveMint.
The three new corridors that the railways plans to build are the 2,328 km-long East-West Corridor between Kolkata and Mumbai, the 2,327 km-long North-South Corridor between Delhi and Chennai and the 1,114 km-long East Coast Corridor between Kharagpur and Vijaywada.
The preliminary engineering and traffic system study of these three new DFCs, covering 5,769 km, has already been completed.
https://www.dnaindia.com/india/report-d ... ch-2775138Drilling for Bullet Train by next March
Project executor has floated the tenders for 26-km tunnelling work
Mammoth drills are expected to pierce the earth in Mumbai for India's first Bullet Train by March next year. Project executor National High-Speed Rail Corporation Limited, which is still acquiring land for the rail link between Mumbai and Ahmedabad, has called tenders for tunnelling work between Bandra-Kurla Complex and Shilphata.
The development comes close on the heels of Rs 10,000 crore being set aside in this year's Union Budget for the high-speed rail estimated to cost Rs 1.08 lakh crore.
The tenders, floated a few days ago, pertain to two legs of the construction for which August is the deadline. One, an underground railway station at BKC; two, a double line from BKC via Thane and Palghar districts in Maharashtra. For the works, tunnel boring machines will go 30-45 metres deep into the earth, drilling through basalt rocks, even under the Thane creek, thus kicking off the project.
Together, the tunnels will be 26 kms long, and the single longest one will run 21 kms underneath the Thane creek. The closest it will come to the creek's abyss will be about 10 metres, marking the route's deepest point.
CHALLENGES ABOUND
Construction at business hub of BKC not easy
Creating a 3-4-storey underground station at the busy BKC commercial hub will be a challenge for NHSRCL
BKC’s G-block, where the station will come up, is surrounded by skyscrapers occupied by MNCs, banks, etc
In the same area, MMRDA will be constructing the International Financial Services Centre
Besides, Metro rail work is underway parallelly
"We will open the tenders after September. It will take a few months to select the contractor. If all goes to plan, then the work can start at the end of this financial year," said Achal Khare, the managing director of NHSRCL.
Senior railway officials looped in on the project said tunnelling will be carried out at BKC, Vikhroli, Savli and all the way till Shilphata. The tunnels will be 17.5 metres in diameter, or twice the size of the metro rail tunnels being dug across the megapolis. Nearly 13 metres of the width will be occupied by two parallel tracks, running up and down through the city towards Gujarat.
Three tunnel boring machines (TBMs) and three New Austrian Tunnelling Method (NATM) machines will be pressed into service for the task.
"We anticipate generating 40 lakh cubic metres of muck from the tunnelling work. It will be used to level Parsik Hill and plant trees, as the area has lost much of its green cover over the years," said an official. Incidentally, more than 53,000 trees will have to be sacrificed for the rail, as the government informed the Rajya Sabha last week.
Tough to crack
Drilling the tunnels is not a tough job. It is creating a three-to-four-storey underground station at the bustling commercial hub of Bandra Kurla Complex that the NHSRCL is worried about. The G-block, where the station will come up 30 metres below, is surrounded by skyscrapers occupied by multinational companies, private banks and other commercial offices. On the same land, the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) will be constructing the International Financial Services Centre.
Sources said that vertical excavation on reclaimed land is a concern, as drilling should not weaken the buildings there. "We have already begun work of checking the physical condition of buildings in BKC," said a senior railway official.
Furthermore, since BKC is near the Mithi River, it would be difficult to drill down here as soil would be softer. This work alone will generate 8 lakh cubic metres of muck, whose disposal is a big question. Construction of the station itself will require a humongous 2.5 lakh cubic metres of cement and 75,000 tonnes of steel.
"There is limited space for constructing this railway station as Metro rail work is underway parallelly. The Metro rail yard is also there. Then there is a 45-metre wide road in the middle which sees continuous traffic," said a rail official.
21km?..or 21m? 21m should be around 5 floors height, which sounds deep enough. At those depths, the tunnel might be coming across the pile foundations of some skyscrapers of BKC. Maybe thats what they are talking about.A Nandy wrote:
Also 21 kms deep seems to imply that they will be far below the foundations of the skyscrapers anyway before they start moving to the east, so whats the concern? The MMRDA grounds look like the ideal place to sink the shaft
Hyperloop approvedThe Devendra Fadnavis led Maharashtra cabinet on Tuesday (31 July) approved the Pune-Mumbai hyperloop project which promises to cut travel time from over three hours to just 23 minutes, Indian Express has reported.
Pune Metropolitan Regional Development Authority (PMRDA) which is spearheading this project is all set to float a tender for the first phase next month. Billionaire Richard Branson’s Virgin Hyperloop One is the favourite to bag the project which needs a total investment of Rs 70,000 crore.
The hyperloop project will be divided in two phases. Phase-I which will be a 11.8 km demonstration track needing an investment of Rs 5,000 crore. The Maharashtra government has already inked a memorandum of understanding with Virgin Hyperloop to develop this test track in Pimpri-Chinchwad’s Wakad.
As things stand, Virgin is all set to begin construction of the first phase by the year end. Work is expected to be completed by 2023. In the second phase of the project, Wakad will be connected to Kurla, 117 km away in Mumbai.
At the heart of the Train-18 controversy is the rivalry between the electrical and mechanical departments which played out over the procurement of an industry-changing propulsion system that ICF procured from a Hyderabad-based company for Train-18. That the officers of ICF, which is dominated by mechanical engineers, did not enable a ‘level-playing field’ for the contract is the accusation. Questions were raised by electrical officers at every step after the first rake was commissioned in 2018.
The propulsion system of the first two trains was an innovation that sent ripples through the industry, said a top official. It had to be designed for an axle load, the weight that the train could carry, for 17 tonnes, to enable the maximum speed of 130kmph. For this, the company ensured the traction system was fully suspended, as opposed to the earlier practice of resting on the axle
The production of Vande Bharat was stopped by the Railway ministry in Integral Coach Factory as the government aims to improve the product design in subsequent version of product.
“This stoppage of work has caused a gloom among the suppliers in and around Chennai since they had worked equally diligently to make the project a success and had invested crores of rupees in developing new and high tech products. They believe that several multinational firms are behind the repeated stalling of the tender process, which had earlier resulted in development of low cost indigenous alternatives,” quoted The Hindu as statement of a Railway official.
It should be noted that Vande Bharat type trains have been developed successfully for the first time on Indian Railways, however, improvement in product design in subsequent version of product has always been endeavor of Railway Production Units and RDSO, in order to optimize its performance. RDSO is currently working in this direction to further improve upon the product design by making improvement in technical specifications.
According to sources, As soon as Research Design and Standards Organization (RDSO) is ready with the specifications, tendering process will be initiated at ICF in a transparent manner without any delay, providing level playing field to all prospective bidders in a transparent manner and in accordance with `Make in India’ policy initiative of Government of India as envisioned by our Hon’ble Prime Minister. It is expected that regular production of this train will be started at ICF during 2020-21.
OpIndia reached out to senior railway officials to get clarity on what the truth of the matter was. The railway officials said that the Hyderabad based company that had supplied the propulsion system was given the go-ahead to supply to the company directly without any tendering against the existing contract of supply of propulsion equipment for the suburban train, thereby bypassing the norms of competition that ensure the highest level of transparency and quality. In subsequent tenders of ICF for procurement of propulsion equipment, it has been observed that undue favours have apparently been given through tailor-made eligibility criteria to suit Hyderabad firm and to systematically keep other eligible players including one navratna public sector company out of fray deliberately so as to ensure that the said company gets unhindered business without following due process of tendering and without any improvement in product design.
Prime Minister Modi’s vision has been to ensure transparency within the system and Railway Minister Piyush Goyal echoes that sentiment.
Speaking to OpIndia, the official also confirmed that the vigilance wing of Railway Board has indeed initiated an inquiry against the officials who confirmed the order to the Hyderabad firm without accepting tenders from other bidders to ensure competition, fairness and transparency.
The official said, “It has been the foundation of the Modi government and especially Railways headed by Minister Piyush Goyal to ensure transparency and fairness in the procurement system. The officials who breached the process and granted the tender to the Hyderabad based company without accepting bids from others will be taken to task. As soon as the process is over and RDSO comes up with revised specifications, the tendering process will resume”.
Sundara Rajan @sundarmail Jul 10On a whole lot of people with a whole lot of concerns...on all those who are forever trying to teach something to others...
Shikwa-e-zulmat-e-shab* se kahin behtar tha,
apne hisse ki ek shama jalate jaate
* complaints about darkness of the night
....In the process, we as a nation continue to lose time, money and competitiveness.
When a metro coach costs Rs 10-12 crores in mass production and first set of Train 18 coach costs Rs 6 crores, vested interests find everything wrong with Train 18!
Sridhar Joshi @brahmmajoshi Aug 8Kashmir integrated with India...time now to plan an indigenous Train 18 like train, Delhi to Srinagar in less than 12 hours...if required, an electro-diesel version or if electrified, regular Train 18...something eminently doable, but will we able to do it?
ManiSudhanshu @ManiSudhanshu58 Aug 9Let us first fix the inter-departmental jealousy and the crab mentality in the higher echelons.
Jealousy is incorrigible and crabs will remain crabs!
Nothing’s been cleared but everything’s been confirmed by this article. Production stopped and will start next year. Contracts cancelled, vigilance enquirers started against officials who were working in the project and RDSO has taken over the project specifications.pandyan wrote:Exclusive: Railway officials clear the air on Vande Bharat Express and the alleged ‘derailment of production’
https://www.opindia.com/2019/08/exclusi ... roduction/OpIndia reached out to senior railway officials to get clarity on what the truth of the matter was. The railway officials said that the Hyderabad based company that had supplied the propulsion system was given the go-ahead to supply to the company directly without any tendering against the existing contract of supply of propulsion equipment for the suburban train, thereby bypassing the norms of competition that ensure the highest level of transparency and quality. In subsequent tenders of ICF for procurement of propulsion equipment, it has been observed that undue favours have apparently been given through tailor-made eligibility criteria to suit Hyderabad firm and to systematically keep other eligible players including one navratna public sector company out of fray deliberately so as to ensure that the said company gets unhindered business without following due process of tendering and without any improvement in product design.Prime Minister Modi’s vision has been to ensure transparency within the system and Railway Minister Piyush Goyal echoes that sentiment.Speaking to OpIndia, the official also confirmed that the vigilance wing of Railway Board has indeed initiated an inquiry against the officials who confirmed the order to the Hyderabad firm without accepting tenders from other bidders to ensure competition, fairness and transparency.
The official said, “It has been the foundation of the Modi government and especially Railways headed by Minister Piyush Goyal to ensure transparency and fairness in the procurement system. The officials who breached the process and granted the tender to the Hyderabad based company without accepting bids from others will be taken to task. As soon as the process is over and RDSO comes up with revised specifications, the tendering process will resume”.
