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Tyne & Wear Metro: Fleet Refurbishment List
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ModernRailways
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Notice how the sound stays in the same place. And also how it remains even as the second car goes by.
AutoKratz
Member
Random question but I’ve got no idea why... does anyone know why they made the windows on the doors smaller as part of the refurbishment? They have a thick plastic seal with screws in around them now. The normal windows haven’t changed so why would they do that on the door windows?
ModernRailways
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They didn't do anything of the sort?
AutoKratz
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It’s hard to describe this shows it well...
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DanNCL
Established Member
4083 and 4040 have the same window surrounds as in the last photo. I think that changed in the mid 2000s, it isn't new.
AutoKratz
Member
This is not a change in the size of the windows per-se, but a change in the fixings that bond the glass to the frame.
The original design used a simple rubber seal, which was sadly not very strong, and saw the windows kicked out frequently by those of lesser intelect.
The new frames are thicker, and hold the glass panels in much more securely. This was a mod that got applied a few years after the late '90s refit.
I heard this was more or less the reason also and I think they look a lot smarter when the doors were painted yellow. Interesting to get all 88 metrocars fitted with these frames took many years for some reason, 4041 had them fitted when down in Doncaster yet some I believe got fitted during 1/2 life refurbishment.
Also any reason why the prototypes never received them?
None of these were fitted at Doncaster, and I don't think this mod started being applied long enough ago to conincide with the 1/2 life work, though it may have been soon enough for the last few sets to be modified at the same time.
These were all completed several years ago as part of a dedicated project, and were done at Gosforth TMD. They were mostly done when units had door panels swapped out, or were in for another reason. On a few occasions I did see units with both styles of windows.
The prototypes likely didn't get this mod as their door panels are a different design with slightly larger window cutouts, and thus would have required a different design of the new gasket. I guess Nexus figured that having 4 coaches in total out of the entire fleet without the mod was an acceptable risk.
Tetchytyke
Veteran Member
A whole system shut down this evening and tomorrow morning. No replacement buses tonight, so the last Metros are about 10pm.
Nexus, cretins that they are, reckon they couldn't get any buses to cover the last hour of service, or push the work back an hour and reopen an hour later on Sunday morning. Utter morons run this system. No wonder passenger numbers are down. I've bought a car to avoid the constant problems; best thing I've done.
Nexus, cretins that they are, reckon they couldn't get any buses to cover the last hour of service, or push the work back an hour and reopen an hour later on Sunday morning. Utter morons run this system. No wonder passenger numbers are down. I've bought a car to avoid the constant problems; best thing I've done.
AutoKratz
Member
I know the metro has problems but I think most of the issues are blown way out of proportion by social media moaners. I started a new job in Newcastle 4 months ago and was wary of using the metro but I’ve only been caught up in disruption 3 times in 4 months and even then it wasn’t a big deal.
Tetchytyke
Veteran Member
Luck of the draw. I've been caught up pretty much at least once or twice every week this year. Probably also depends how you define problems; when my commute is 15 minutes, a missing train is actually a big deal. The worst I've had is a 45 minute wait for a Metro due to a train failure.
I'm glad of the car, that's for damn certain. I simply cannot rely on it anymore. Even with the traffic problems in North Tyneside, especially around Cobalt, with the car I can rely on getting to and from work on time. I can't with Metro, and when a weekly pass is almost double what I spend in petrol...
MetroCar4058
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Can’t win can they, let’s just never do any work and let the system fall apart on infrastructure that is 40 years old and life expired. The work needed to be done and I don’t see the issue of coming home an hour early from town or having a big night out.
To be fair, they are putting extra money into increasing in service reliability and theee has been an improvement with minor faults. Of course the summer normally is a better time for Metro. It’s just when it goes wrong it really does go wrong. It is really about holding on for the next 4 years or so.
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Tetchytyke
Veteran Member
Friends of mine work in town and couldn't get home. No reason why the close and resumption of service couldn't have been one hour later. No reason why buses couldn't have been sourced instead; they were for the Coast via Wallsend and on Sunday morning. Still, cabbies are happy, they'll have made a killing.
The work needed doing, of course, my issue is the grunt and the shrug at leaving people stranded up to two hours before the advertised end of service. The last trains to Sunderland were barely after 10pm. It's disgraceful. And to see Metro comments on Facebook (now deleted) claiming nobody complaining would want to work overtime show just how low regard Nexus have for their customers. I'm not a formal complainer but I have done about that.
Train faults last night closed the line and this morning left a 30 minute gap in service around the Coast. Metro is great if you're not in any hurry, but simply can't be relied upon for work. I can drive to work in 20 minutes, about the same time as Metro, but I can rely on the roads. It feels like "delays to service Metro apologises" is a daily message now. How many times has the (new) OHL failed between Wallsend and North Shields recently?
The repeated cuts to the peak timetable just make things even more unpleasant. The tiniest foul up and Metro are leaving passengers behind as far out as Shiremoor and Northumberland Park in the peaks. And Nexus still argue our three-zone tickets are too cheap, hence repeated above-inflation rises whilst student tickets get cheaper.
As for the new trains, they should gave been ordered in 2006 when they were, instead, farting around with ideas of running trams to Washington.
Nexus are shockingly incompetent. It's not just Metro. Look how often the ferry has been cancelled recently due to mechanical failures. It was off again this morning despite them having a brand new boat. Also look how Ferry managers were prioritising private sightseeing bookings over passenger services whilst they were down to one boat during scheduled servicing. They're still doing it now whenever one of the two boats conks out.
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ModernRailways
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The signalling upgrade (RTMS) messed everything up. They're starting to work again, but some clever clogs has decided that trains for 'The Coast' are now going towards 'Whitley Bay', trains to 'Airport' are now going to 'The Airport'. There's loads of other issues that have gone on with the work too, we have a few sets of infrastructure that aren't usable due to the upgrade and are being worked on. Thankfully, the depot has avoided the main load of hassle and is still using the old way of directing trains with buttons and knobs.
The PIS on trains has been working on very few units for a while now. It's not likely part of the issues following the RTMS upgrade.
The new destination situation is rather annoying. "W'tley Bay" being shown when the displays have enough characters to not abbreviate, and all the inconsistent destination names are really bad for passengers who don't have English as their first language, or suffer from literacy issues.
There are a few other odd things too - such as "This Train is for South Shields". Train shouldn't be capitalised. Trains that are being withdrawn from service also show as "This Train is for DEPP".
This sort of thing needs to be sorted out. Way-finding signange and PIS systems need to be consistent to make sure the system is accessible, not to keep things looking professional. The on-train PIS announcing "This is Central" and "Next station Central" is a good example of this too.
These systems all need a good deal of attention to get things tidied up once any remaining operational aspects of the RTMS are brought into service.
I've heard mention that unit 4022 is now not destined for the razor factory afterall. Apparently it's now being repaired at Wabtec.
Is there any truth in this?
There is also one of the non-refitted units being stripped down in the depot currently. Is this something specific for that set, or part of a plan to refurb the 4 remaining sets in-house?
Is there any truth in this?
There is also one of the non-refitted units being stripped down in the depot currently. Is this something specific for that set, or part of a plan to refurb the 4 remaining sets in-house?
DanNCL
Established Member
I think that's probably 4040, seeing as 4001, 4002 and 4083 have all been in service in the last few weeks. I've no idea why, possibly as a source of spare parts?
The body was all stripped away, so looked like an attempt to fix corrosion of some kind, but seems odd to do that now.
DanNCL
Established Member
Have you got a photo?
Sounds to me like one of three things - corrosion repair, it's being used for spare parts, or it's being scrapped. I suspect the first two are most likely...
No photos of my own sadly. It had pretty much the majority of the body paneling removed, and the interior had been stripped out, with only the ceiling panels and lighting left in place.
As I say, I'm pretty sure it's corrosion repair to the body, but I'm just curious as to why they are doing it. The entire refurbishment was highly motivated by fixing corrosion, and when the project went over budget there was a calculated decision made to exclude 4 units. From what I remember the selected units were based on 2 being the prototype sets (high chance of deviation from design and unforseen issues), and the other two being some of the better fairing examples from the production fleet.
It just seems very odd that one would be selected now, unless there is a plan to refurbish the remaining 4 in-house, or this unit has suffered some sort of recent issue. If it was spare parts, I'm sure we'd have seen 4022 being stripped first owing to it's severely damaged centre section.
DanNCL
Established Member
Hopefully it is - they could do with as many units operational as they can get at the minute.
4040 seems to have been used more intensively than the other three of the unrefurbished units (although that's not been the case this year), so that's possibly something to do with it too?
I'm not sure about an in-house refurbishment personally - I'm surprised that'd be economical considering they've only got a few years left.
But is there any reason to why the in train displays aren't working, is it driver laziness or are they generally mostly broken, my partner suffers from bad sight and the information displays are a godsend to her since they installed them.
I contacted nexus about them but was just met with a generic response of "a few of them have issues but nexus are working tirelessly to fix them"
Peter Mugridge
Veteran Member
Just a thought on the 4022 / 4040 issue - could they be making one good one out of two bad ones?
I sympathise. I’ve a few colleagues with the same issues, they’ve switched to the bus.
Nexus/Metro Comms excel at generic, unhelpful and sarcastic responses. They really ought to spend some money on social media training.
There's a photo on Flickr from a group visit to the depot which shows what Hacman is describing although at the time of the photo it was just one section that has been removed rather than the whole unit(although that could be the case right now). Be interresting too see what will happen to this unit although did the prototypes received any similar treatment before getting the fleet livery?
If 4022 is at Webtec then what was the reason it went down to Bristol?
As for the upgrades behind the scenes and what us showing on the boards then I do agree that having Whitley Bay abbreviated seems unnessary but it's no real difference to what is present as I believe "This train is for the Coast(via Newcastle) ends at Whitley Bay where it then says This train is for St James and vice versa for the opposite direction. I suppose the idea is to stop passengers going all the way round the coast to get to Wallsend for example when there is a quicker way via Monument P3 but abbreviating it does not look professional.
Apparently the boards at Monument P3 now show when the next train is due. Is this true?
danpick
Member
4033 and 4082 have lost their Emirates adverts, 4082 on a Coast, and 4033 on 101.
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