Railways completes trial of first LHB 3-tier Economy Class Coach

The Ministry of Railways has informed that trials of the Kapurthala Coach Factory manufactured first prototype Linke-Hofmann-Busch (LHB) AC three-tier economy class coach have been successfully completed.

New Delhi: Trial for the first prototype Linke-Hofmann-Busch (LHB) AC three-tier economy class coach has been successfully completed, informed Ministry of Railways. The coaches have been rolled out by Kapurthala Coach Factory. After necessary sanctions, these Economy class coaches will be inducted in all Mail/Express trains, which are currently running with LHB coaches, except for Rajdhani, Shatabdi, Duronto and Jan Shatabdi like other special trains.

These new LHB coaches have a number of salient features including the increase in passenger capacity. In these coaches, the passenger capacity has been increased to 83 berths. In addition to this, seats and berths have a modular design to improve comfort, reduced weight and higher maintainability as well as AC ducting by providing individual vents for all berths.

In terms of design, improved passenger conveniences have been taken care of in form of foldable snack tables, injury-free spaces and holders for water bottles, mobile phone and magazines. Individual reading lights and mobile charging points have also been given for each berth. KCF has also increased headroom in the middle and upper berths and ergonomically improved design of ladder for accessing the middle and upper berths have been introduced, for which passengers usually face a lot of problems.

Improved design of the Indian and the Western-style lavatories, ergonomic entrance, luminescent aisle markers and illuminated berth indicators integral with night lights with luminescent berth numbers have been added in the features of these coaches. To improve fire safety standards by ensuring compliance to the world benchmark of EN45545-2 HL3 for materials.

Provision of an enabling entrance and compartment for Divyangjan with wheelchair access along with the provision of Divyangjan friendly toilet with wheelchair access has also been introduced, complying with Sugamya Bharat Abhiyan norms. Indian Railways had decided to proliferate Linke LHB coaches, as they are technologically superior, aesthetics and safety features as compared to the conventional Integral Coach Factory (ICF) type coaches. Due to this, Railways' Production Units had stopped the manufacturing of ICF type coaches from the year 2018-19.

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