SWR Repaints and Refurbishments

[BestWestern]

Oh...

Thank heavens quite a few of them are freshly painted and won't be needing that doing to them for a good while.

 

[SpacePhoenix]

Oh...

Thank heavens quite a few of them are freshly painted and won't be needing that doing to them for a good while.

What's the normal time between full repaints for a given unit?

 

[BestWestern]

What's the normal time between full repaints for a given unit?

Ordinarily I'd expect the freshly painted units to last the seven years of the franchise. Corporate vanity might dictate otherwise, of course.

 

[TEW]

I believe it was around 2007/8 that the 159s were last refurbished and repainted, so roughly 10 years since they were last repainted.

 

[yorksrob]

I believe it was around 2007/8 that the 159s were last refurbished and repainted, so roughly 10 years since they were last repainted.

And they still look the business, inside and out, even now (except the loos which were looking a bit tired).

 

[3141]

Ordinarily I'd expect the freshly painted units to last the seven years of the franchise. Corporate vanity might dictate otherwise, of course.

Would "corporate vanity" be the right term for the rapid roll-out of new train liveries, station repaints and so by Chris Green on Network Southeast?

 

[yorksrob]

Would "corporate vanity" be the right term for the rapid roll-out of new train liveries, station repaints and so by Chris Green on Network Southeast?

I'm not sure it was rolled out all that quickly. Toothpaste seemed to co-exist with Jaffa Cake for quite a while down my way, as I recall.

 

[Julius]

I'm pretty sure that the MD of South Western Railway - Andy Mellors has said that there will be no rebrand until after the Waterloo works. I wouldnt even expect the SWT branding to be removed until later.

Thanks,
Ross

I was in London when works were happening at Waterloo, and they were just releasing ‘444040’s new vinyl, I happend to see it as well!

 

[BestWestern]

Would "corporate vanity" be the right term for the rapid roll-out of new train liveries, station repaints and so by Chris Green on Network Southeast?

'Revolutionary', would be the right term for Network SE. Possibly along with 'saving BR from a slow, grim death'. That is rather different from the modern standard of 'the latest new franchisee painting everything again', which of course happens regularly (though not, until now, in SWT land). I'm not sure of the point you're making, NSE was something completely different to the franchise carousel?

 

[Goldfish62]

'Revolutionary', would be the right term for Network SE. Possibly along with 'saving BR from a slow, grim death'. That is rather different from the modern standard of 'the latest new franchisee painting everything again', which of course happens regularly (though not, until now, in SWT land). I'm not sure of the point you're making, NSE was something completely different to the franchise carousel?

This is true, although the SWT brand has lasted twice as long as NSE and almost as long as BR corporate blue. And let's not forget the multiple versions of SWT logo and station nameboards that SWT indulged in in the first few years.

The franchise specification asked for a brand and livery that would last across several franchises, so I think the new SWR brand will be around for a very long time, irrespective of who wins the next franchise.

 

[smilerish]

If anyone's interested, I was surprised to catch a reliveried 158 this morning working the Salisbury 6 (although I'm now caught up on the earlier discussion about this). Here's a photo taken while standing at Southampton Central.

 

[Class455]

Cant believe how lazy SWR have been with their rebranding. They took over the franchise in August, it is now November and only 4 units have been rebranded in SWR livery/had SWR stickers applied. People still seem to think its still South West Trains! I'm also very surprised that none of the Class 450's have been rebranded either.

Have any 455's been rebranded or is 5864 still the only one?

 

[DelW]

Cant believe how lazy SWR have been with their rebranding. They took over the franchise in August, it is now November and only 4 units have been rebranded in SWR livery/had SWR stickers applied. People still seem to think its still South West Trains! I'm also very surprised that none of the Class 450's have been rebranded either.

In view of the dire performance of the routes out of Waterloo since the August blockade, perhaps SWR mamagement are trying to avoid the accusation that they are more interested in repainting trains than in running a reliable service. (I know that a lot of the issues have been NR not SWR responsibility, but that wouldn't stop the press or Twitterers blaming SWR.)

I am surprised that we haven't seen more vinyl stickers simply amending the relevant logos though.

 

[387star]

Makes sense... repaint once refurbish
Leave everything else untouched

Work will soon start on the 442/444/450 fleet so all in good time

I'd rather south west trains branding remains on the old livery as it looks more in keeping !

 

[Lockwood]

only 4 units have been rebranded in SWR livery/had SWR stickers applied.

444040, 158887 and which others?

 

[XCTurbostar]

444040, 158887 and which others?

158888

 

[Class455]

deleted

 

[Domh245]

A few of the 707s (004 and 006 at least) are stickered with the new logo up as well.

 

[wipers]

I really don't understand the logic of re-branding the trains that the AVENTRA units will replace in a few years first?.... surely you do the 444's and the 450's first and just re-sticker the logos on the stuff that's going? Or am I missing something?...

 

[Domh245]

I really don't understand the logic of re-branding the trains that the AVENTRA units will replace in a few years first?.... surely you do the 444's and the 450's first and just re-sticker the logos on the stuff that's going? Or am I missing something?...

I expect the reasoning behind that particular situation was that a) they were sat in the depot doing nothing whilst the Waterloo works happen, and b) as far as the majority of the public were concerned, they are new trains, so if they can put their name on it, it's good PR (despite the fact that everything else is obviously SWT, plus plenty of the fleet running around with the old logos on them). I feel that I should also point out that it is just the logo that has changed

 

[superalbs]

Front page of this thread is now adorned with a list of all units and their livery.

Click below:
>>>SWR Repaints and Refurbishments<<<

 

[TEW]

A few of the 707s (004 and 006 at least) are stickered with the new logo up as well.

And 5864. It is just the two 707s. So that's 6 units in total either in the livery or with branding.

 

[Suraggu]

Pretty sure 5904 is SWR branded.

 

[Goldfish62]

'Revolutionary', would be the right term for Network SE. Possibly along with 'saving BR from a slow, grim death'. That is rather different from the modern standard of 'the latest new franchisee painting everything again', which of course happens regularly (though not, until now, in SWT land). I'm not sure of the point you're making, NSE was something completely different to the franchise carousel?

SWT in the early days seemed to change their branding and station nameboards every five minutes.

 

[BestWestern]

SWT in the early days seemed to change their branding and station nameboards every five minutes.

'The early days' being twenty years ago, of course. The SWT brand was smart, consistent and instantly recognisable for well over a decade, just as a strong brand should be. The early SWT livery was actually quite clever, I thought. A subtle but noticeable evolution of the existing NSE scheme, which introduced the Stagecoach brand whilst keeping the whole fleet reasonably well matched through the transition. Having done that, the way was then paved for further evolution of the brand into the eventual livery. The biggest alteration was the changing of the logo, but of course legend has it that was down to advice to get shot of the Stagecoach tagline.

 

[fairysdad]

Cant believe how lazy SWR have been with their rebranding. They took over the franchise in August, it is now November and only 4 units have been rebranded in SWR livery/had SWR stickers applied. People still seem to think its still South West Trains! I'm also very surprised that none of the Class 450's have been rebranded either.

Have any 455's been rebranded or is 5864 still the only one?

I was thinking this the other day myself. It's almost as if First didn't really want the franchise and were quite surprised that they got it. There was very little output from First between them being announced as the awardees, and they've been somewhat lacklustre in updating branding since. I know that if they actually did spend the first two months of their franchise updating everything in sight they'd probably get a bit of flack for it, but there is a lot of stuff that could be done without any major work - sending a box of 'South Western Railway' stickers to a ticket office to update platform signage for instance wouldn't take too much trouble. Same with inside the trains - a box of SWR stickers given out when a unit gets its end-of-day litter pick wouldn't take that much longer in an evening to do and would do the job. OK, it's SWT's fault, but there's still signs up in the red units that announce that Waterloo is the exchange for International services!

 

[pompeyfan]

The cleaners have a hard enough job as it is, I don’t think they need any extra work. The cleaners would probably end up doing a quick, and probably scruffy job of it, much better idea to get the professionals in.

 

[fairysdad]

To be honest, my original version of that suggested the guards could do it! I am just thinking the internal branding not the external though.

The external branding would definitely need a professional in to do it. That said, surely patching over 'South West Trains' with 'South Western Railway' it isn't actually that long a job to do per train - three hours max surely - and could be done relatively simply while the train is in depot? Yes, the SWR fleet is quite stretched, but there are downtimes for stock.

 

[pompeyfan]

To be honest, my original version of that suggested the guards could do it! I am just thinking the internal branding not the external though.

The external branding would definitely need a professional in to do it. That said, surely patching over 'South West Trains' with 'South Western Railway' it isn't actually that long a job to do per train - three hours max surely - and could be done relatively simply while the train is in depot? Yes, the SWR fleet is quite stretched, but there are downtimes for stock.

I see what you’re saying, but who’s going to pick up that extra work? You’d want professionals to work around the cleaners while the stock is stabled overnight. You’d need to scrape the old internal stickers off, clean the glass spotlessly, then apply the new sticker, you’re probably looking at 30 minutes per sticker, you’ve got 18 stickers per carriage on a 450 and 12 per carriage on a 444 (possibly more depending on which exact carriage is being worked on) nice thought but more too it.

 

[whhistle]

They could just sticker over the old stickers... especially on stock they're getting rid of.

I wonder if this is Japan having some input rather than First...
Are uniforms still the same? I'm sort of surprised in a way as I thought this is what the cross-over period was for... getting branding things, uniforms, passes all printed and ready.
Granted, it wouldn't be a complete transformation overnight but they could have made more effort than what they have done at the moment.