Afcons’ Agra Metro TBM S115 Records Breakthrough at Raja Ki Mandi

Afcons Infrastructure – Sam India Consortium on Sunday celebrated tunnel boring machine (TBM) S115’s breakthrough at Raja Ki Mandi Station for Agra Metro Phase 1 project‘s 14.25 km Line-1 (Sikandra – Taj East Gate).

This was S115’s second breakthrough and the fourth breakthrough for the remaining portion of Agra Metro Line-1’s underground section, outside of the operational Priority Corridor, between RBS Ramp and Mankameshwar Mandir Station. Overall, this was the 12th breakthrough for 7.93 km Package AGCC-02 connecting RBS Ramp – Taj Mahal Ramp.

S115 is a refurbished Terratec Earth Pressure Balance (EPB) machine and Afcons’ fourth TBM. It was commissioned in December 2023 to build a 2.2 km tunnel for the up-line from RBS College Ramp towards Agra College Interchange Station.

For its first drive which ended in April, it built a 720m tunnel for the up-line from RBS Ramp to RBS College Station in 4 months. It was then dragged through RBS College’s station box and relaunched in May-end towards Raji Ki Mandi Station – covering a distance of 684m in just 68 days.

Uttar Pradesh Metro Rail Corporation (UPMRC) had awarded Afcons – Sam India Consortium with underground Package AGCC-02’s Rs. 1819.79 crore civil construction contract in March 2022 with a 48 month deadline.

Their section from chainage 3630.000 to 11564.485 consists of twin tunnels connecting 7 stations at Taj Mahal, Agra Fort, Jama Masjid, SN Medical College, Agra College, Raja Ki Mandi and RBS College.

TBM S115 has an interesting history. It’s one of Afcons’ three machines (S88, S89 or S90) which was used to build 6 tunnels on 82 km Delhi – Meerut RRTS project’s Package 8 within Meerut city.

The machine with an original cutterhead diameter of 7.51m was downsized and reconfigured to meet Agra Metro’s tunnel requirements. A new cutterhead was attached which I believe has a diameter of around 6.52 meters.

S115 will now be dragged through Raja Ki Mandi’s station box and recommissioned towards Agra College Station for its last drive, covering a distance of roughly 535 meters.

With 12 breakthroughs squared away, there are now 6 more breakthroughs left in Phase 1 project: 1 at Raja ki Mandi, 2 at Agra College, 1 at SN Medical College and 2 at Mankameshwar (Jama Masjid). 

The next breakthrough within the next month will either be made by TBM Shivaji (Herrenkhecht S-718C) which is excavating the parallel tunnel from RBS College to Raja Ki Mandi OR by TBM Ganga (Robbins 324) which is excavating from Agra College to SN Medical College. Stay tuned!

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– TMRG