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Indian Railways’ Record Maximum Number of LHB Coaches Produced in a Month

Indian Railways’ production unit Rail Coach Factory (RCF) Kapurthala has manufactured a record 151 Linke Hofmann Busch (LHB) coaches in the month of July. This is the highest number of production of LHB coaches by RCF in a single month since it began manufacturing of LHB coaches in 2002.

According to a statement, “RCF manufactured 107 LHB coaches in June and in the first four months of the current financial, it has produced 310 coaches out of which 307 are modern LHB coaches. It has been quite a remarkable journey by RCF since it manufactured the first LHB rake of Rajdhani Express in 2003. RCF has manufactured 6500 LHB coaches till now.

Initially LHB coaches were used only in the premium trains of Indian Railways like Rajdhani, Shatabdi and Duronto Express, but now Indian Railways has decided to run all its passengers trains on LHB rakes which are more lighter and safer than the earlier ICF coaches.

Railway Minister Piyush Goyal took to Twitter to applaud the work done by the RCF and tweeted, “Production of safer LHB coaches- Yet another ‘Make in India’ Success Story!

Rail Coach Factory, Kapurthala sets a record by producing 151 LHB coaches in July’20, thrice the production of July’19. Boosting job creation, this is its highest ever monthly production. “

Linke Hofmann Busch (LHB) design coaches are lighter in weight, have higher carrying capacity, higher speed potential, increased codal life and better safety. LHB passenger coaches plying over Indian Railways (IR) have been designed with the necessary safety features considering the operating conditions over Indian Railways. Moreover, they have anti-climbing features as well. The anti-climbing features of these coaches prevent them from getting piled up during accidents.

In the year 2017, the first 100 per cent ‘Make in India’ LHB coach was manufactured by the Integral Coach Factory (ICF), Chennai. In Indian Railways trains, the safer and better LHB coaches are fast replacing the old ICF- design coaches. Moreover, the production of ICF- design train coaches has already been stopped by the Railway Ministry.

Over the last few years, many trains have been upgraded with modern LHB rakes .The national transporter hopes to replace all conventional ICF coaches with LHB coaches in the near future.