[arnav17]

The Railway minister of India Shri Ashwini Vaishnav unvieled the Sleeper Coach prototype in Bengaluru today at the BEML and also laid the foundation store for a new hangar.

The sleeper train looks great IMHO but it won't take long for the public to misuse it and ruin it. There is always someone who wants to spoil the facilities given for greater good.

What are your thoughts on this?

Some pics:








Source : IndiaToday

[Turbohead]

I saw the touch control doors on one of the videos and I'm not impressed - totally unnecessary and a possible point of failure. I expect Indian Railways to know better - they really need abuse friendly, efficient, easy to clean coaches with minimum maintenance. Fancy should be their last priority.

Hope sense prevails and the actual product can withstand the shenanigans of crazy people in our society.

[narayans80]

Looks more or less like the present day 3A coach. What is so special here apart from what looks like a screen on the middle berth?

[MyLife_MyCar]

Originally Posted by narayans80

… what looks like a screen on the middle berth?

I think that’s a pocket or a book/magazine holder.

[Sk8r]

Any idea on the pricing ? Sleeper class has been the lifeline of travel for price sensitive/ lower income class people. Not sure how this will be priced. Going by the pricing of the current Vande Bharat trains, it's squarely out of range for the middle class 3AC folks ( pricing & timing ) included.

[am1m]

Originally Posted by narayans80

Looks more or less like the present day 3A coach.

Oh no, looks a lot better. The layout may be essentially the same, but from the photos, I see a lot of improvements, the colour scheme used, hopefully the quality of material used, better space design.

Even the differences between the LHB coaches and the older coaches is enough to make for a more pleasant journey. The visual differences in that case are smaller than the differences between this pic and the standard 3AC coach. But every two months at least, I take one journey on a train with the newer LHB coaches and one on a train with the older coaches and the small differences in the interior are good, the less sway and less noise make a huge difference in the newer coaches.

Hopefully, these will be even more of an improvement.

[DigitalOne]

Originally Posted by arnav17

The sleeper train looks great IMHO but it won't take long for the public to misuse it and ruin it.

The color scheme looks bright and nice . Pull-down screen curtains are a good substitute for traditional cloth curtains.

They could have provided for bottle-holders, a few hooks for hanging light bags, and a mirror.

All VB sleepers are 3-tier only?

[Bibendum90949]

Originally Posted by DigitalOne

All VB sleepers are 3-tier only?

It's got eleven 3 tier coaches, four 2 tier, and a first class coach as well.

[safari_lover]

Originally Posted by Sk8r

Any idea on the pricing ? Sleeper class has been the lifeline of travel for price sensitive/ lower income class people. Not sure how this will be priced. Going by the pricing of the current Vande Bharat trains, it's squarely out of range for the middle class 3AC folks ( pricing & timing ) included.

Given that the current Vande Bharat trains' ticket prices, without meals, are almost same as the 3AC prices, I think sleeper trains' ticket pricing will be at par with the Rajdhani Express trains.

[RM Motorsports]

Details from Sleeper Vande Bharat Express

3AC coaches : 11 → 611 berths
2AC coaches : 4 → 188 berths
1AC coaches : 1 → 24 berths

- Each berth with reading lights, charging sockets, a mobile/magazine holder, a snack table
- Hot water shower for 1st AC passengers
- CCTV, Automatic doors, LED footlights, Ergonomic toilets
- Ovens, bottle coolers, compartments for desserts, boilers, in pantry car.

[ads11]

Does anyone know what the First Class set up looks like?

From what I can tell in the videos we got to see 3AC and 2AC right (going by the three and two berths respectively)?

I think a sleeper version would be lovely. I'd be up for trying it on a cross country journey for a change from flying.

Good to see that they're iterating on the base VB design fairly rapidly.

Sharing the video walkthrough I found:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9yoZYFbbks

[Fx14]

Originally Posted by Sk8r

Any idea on the pricing ? Sleeper class has been the lifeline of travel for price sensitive/ lower income class people. Not sure how this will be priced. Going by the pricing of the current Vande Bharat trains, it's squarely out of range for the middle class 3AC folks ( pricing & timing ) included.

The Sleeper Vande Bharat Express would be fully air conditioned and have the coach configuration of 3AC (11) / 2AC (4) / 1AC (1), as in the Rajdhani trains, which they are expected to replace progressively.

The fares therefore, would most likely be dynamic in nature on the lines of the current Rajdhani trains.

[BANDHAV]

Originally Posted by narayans80

Looks more or less like the present day 3A coach. What is so special here apart from what looks like a screen on the middle berth?

This sounds like a criticism just for the heck of it. This particular design looks far more more modern and upmarket. There could be 100 things in this design which may not be perfect but that is how progress is being made, next iterations would have been better, more rounded, less rough edges and eventually we will have a product which will be truly world class.

[ike]

Originally Posted by Turbohead

Hope sense prevails and the actual product can withstand the shenanigans of crazy people in our society.

Hopefully the people using these high end trains are more sophisticated and there are less crazy people travelling.

[shresan23]

Why, i saw a famous instagram post about unreserved people just cramming themselves onto the VB. It literally looked like a first class local. I guess there is no fixing these fools.

But, somewhere along the line, i feel lik VB was introduced for a very particular class of people, not based on money but based on profession. The timings, the locations, atleast in south india. I dont know if a sleeper is useful, for such a niche crowd.