Integral Coach Factory

R.Shahnawaz khan 1029098 CBS

History
Integral Coach Factory, Chennai, is a premier Production Unit of Indian Railways manufacturing railway passenger coaches. ICF is the first of its kind to be established after Independence for the manufacture of light weight, all steel and all welded Integral railway passenger coaches. The factory was set up in 1955 with Swiss collaboration.

 The factory was set up originally with a capacity to produce 350 coach shells annually. ICF over the decades became very successful in producing the signature integral design (under frames, sidewalls, and roof integrated to form a single tube structure) anti-telescopic coaches of IR, in many different configurations. It now has a capacity of over 1,300 coaches a year.

 Today the coach factory produces more than 170 varieties of coach. It employs about 13,000 people and produces around six coaches a day. A total of 43,551 coaches had been produced till July 2011 by ICF since its inception. ICF had churned out 1,503 coaches in 2010, which was an all time record production.

Production
iCF?s initial plan was to produce 350 Broad Gauge Third Class shells (unfurnished body of the Railway Coaches)only, which were to be furnished by the Zonal Railways? workshops. Later, in view of the severe limitation of capacity of the Railway workshops and also to take advantage of mass production, a separate Furnishing Division was added on 2nd October, 1962.

 The capacity was progressively expanded from the initial 350 shells to 750 fully furnished coaches per annum by 1973-74 with additional inputs. This was enhanced progressively from 850 coaches during 1986-87 to 1000 coaches in 1990-91. The modernization project is under last stage of execution to augment capacity to 1250 coaches and will be over by 2010-11.

Product Range
ICF has been meeting the needs of the Indian Railways for varied types of coaches, however sophisticated the type may be. Some of the important types are: 1. SELF PROPELLED COACHES Electric Multiple Units for suburban services in Metropolitan cities; Diesel Rail Cars; Metro Coaches for Kolkata Metro Railways; Diesel Electric Multiple Units & Diesel Hydraulic Multiple Units for nonelectrified routes and Mainline Electric Multiple Units for long distance inter-city commutership. Accident Relief Trains / Medical Vans OHE Inspection Cars

 2. AIR-CONDITIONED & NON-AIRCONDITIONED PASSENGER COACHES Air-conditioned Sleeper Coaches of first & second class; Air-conditioned Chair Cars of first and second class; Double Decker Coaches with seating capacity for 148 passengers as against the conventional 90 passengers. 3. SPECIAL COACHES Air-conditioned & Non-air-conditioned Pantry Cars High Capacity Power Cars for Shatabdi & Rajdhani Express Trains

FACTORY
ICF is divided into two factories: 1. Shell division 2. Furnishing Division.

SHELL DIVISION
The first is the shell division in which the outer part of a coach as well as the bogies are manufactured. Bogie refers to the wheels on which the coach stands.

FURNISHING DIVISION
The second is the furnishing division in which all the inner accessories are manufactured and placed. This includes air conditioning unit, fans, bulbs, seats, bars and everything else. The whole coach is also painted here.

 Another notable achievement is that ICF has remained virtually independent so far. It is capable of designing and producing all the equipments and machines required, by itself. The only supply needed is that of raw materials. Rest everything including welding machines, generators, motors etc. are produced here itself. It also has two dedicated laboratories to test the quality of the materials being supplied and used.

Materials Management
ICF is an ISO 9001 certified organization, manufacturing different types of coaching stock for the IndianRailways, and other customers. The raw materials and components required for the manufacture of coaches is procured by the Materials Management Department, through tenders. The Department is headed by the Controller of Stores.

Tendering System
The procurement is arranged through the tendering system, as detailed below: Bulletin tenders Limited tenders Open tenders Normally all tenders are issued as e-tenders in IREPS website.

Bulletin tenders
The Bulletin Tenders are issued to all Registered suppliers of ICF. For registration with ICF, the suppliers are required to furnish the required information in the prescribed form, available with the Registration Section of the office of the Controller of Stores/ICF.

Limited and Open Tenders

Limited Tenders are issued to vendors on a selective basis, generally to the registered vendors. Open Tenders are published in the leading newspapers. Unregistered suppliers can participate against the Open Tender subject to fulfilling the requirements mentioned in the tender documents.

Challenge
ICF needed to address increasing demand for rail coaches by streamlining its design process. It Comprised of organizing their large volumes of unstructured and process data.

SHELL DIVISION

ICF FURNISHING DIVISION

STAGES IN FURNISHING DIVISION

Preparatory stage Flooring Electrical wiring of the coach Fixing of the panels Panelling(Drilling,painting) Moulding. ALL these stages takes place in a line.