GWR Class 800

[JN114]

Appreciate it’s a can of worms to open but my sectional appendix still refers to HSTs as Class 253 - as do the stock and crew diagrams, various traction manuals, fault finding matrices and so on... Doesn’t that make them DEMUs as well?

 

[fgwrich]

It’s a bit more than criticism though, it’s constant moaning for 12 months straight.

As apposed to constantly praising them as if they were the best thing to hit the rails and completely dis-allow any reasonable criticism of them?

As above, the 800s are sadly the DfTs fault. The 802s are GWRs own goal.

What I also find amusing with this whole project and affair is that it IS possible to design modern trains around the best features of a Mk3. I know that, because that's exactly what Irish Rail did when lead by Dick Fearn when they replaced their Mk3 fleet with the 22000 DMUs. They had the designers look over the Mk3s and I believe conduct real surveys into what Irish Rail passengers wanted. All of the feedback was then fed back into the design and the result was a spacious, light and bright InterCity DMU which included a buffet counter on the longer distance sets. The funny thing about this, is that the company responsible is the same company that born us the Voyager and the 800. The 800s I'll have to just about live with, even if they are frankly not up to scratch as a HST replacement (Quality wise). It's the 802s that I remain highly not impressed with.

As for rubbing your hands with glee for a HST fault on the Cotswolds yesterday. Yes, HSTs fail. Yes, they are old. But could that fault have been detected or prevented if the HST had been berthed in a depot overnight? The 800s seem to have a much more cosy life than the workhorses of the HSTs, with certain mileage per day diagrams and ending up at a Hitachi Depot per night for a service, but the units are still recording issues in service and a fair chunk seem to be software based. For a train that has supposed to have spent well over 2 years in testing before being released to the general public last year, to have undergone over 60 updates and still be having issues, and is still arriving late into service, questions should rightly be raised. And promises and expectations should be questioned. And Given the issue with the 385s, Hitachi have quite rightly now got a mountain to climb to appear reputable again if they want to win further orders in the future.

 

[coppercapped]

When the HSTs were first introduced there were a series of issues which took several years to work through before a satisfactory performance level was reached. But in the 1970s and 1980s there were fewer trains and fewer passengers and no ’social media’ so breakdowns and delays not only affected fewer people - fewer people heard about them. The delays and cancellations were nonetheless real.

BR continued to trial changes and improvement as shown by the small plates carrying the experiment reference number often attached to the cab doors. Apart from these other major issues included:

• fractured axle box locating arms on the BT10 bogies of the Mark 3 stock. This was solved by using castings with a deeper section between the bearing which attached the arm to the bogie frame and the pan which took the lower end of the primary suspension spring.
• fractures and leaks in the toilet water tank over the coach vestibules
• coach doors opening unexpectedly which led firstly to the removal of the internal handles and later to the introduction of central locking
• endemic problems with the brakes which cracked and spalled discs and the series of trials to find a more suitable brake pad material.
• the cab air conditioning unit also gave problems and was difficult to reach for repair.
• the power unit was also troublesome with cracked cylinder liners, issues with turbo charger bearings and housings and the marginal cooling capacity of the radiators causing problems in warm and hot weather.
• commutation problems with the GEC batch of traction motors
• unsatisfactory lubrication from time to time in the bogie mounted final drive gearboxes
• oil carried over in the exhaust soiled the trailing windscreen as the air flowed down over the rounded top of the cab. This was partially solved by the addition of the plate which stands a few inches proud of the power car roof above which the exhaust vent. This induces clean air to flow over the roof to keep the exhaust clear of the windscreen. However the most effective solution was the replacement of the Paxmans (Paxmen?) by the MTU power plants.

But the point about these issues was that they were (mostly) identified during maintenance and while they impacted train availability, they were less likely to cause breakdowns and delays during a journey. In any event as the HST had two independent power cars they could often keep going and complete the journey.

HSTs on the Western were diagrammed to cover between 700 and 850 miles in a day depending on the diagram - essentially a tank full - and kept this sort of distance up every day for 40 years. I appreciate that the IETs have only been in service for about a year and the number of trains is still growing, but the latest TIN Watch article from Roger Ford in the October Modern Railways shows that in Period 5 of financial year 2018-19 the 32 active sets covered on average 20366 miles. This almost certainly refers to only the 5-car sets and is equivalent to 727 miles per day - what is not clear is whether the mileage of those sets which are locked out of passenger use but still form part of a train is included or not. Nevertheless we can assume that the trains are covering about 700 miles per day in passenger service but each set records about 3 Technical Incidents a month causing a delay of 3 minutes or more.

This is not brilliant, but for an immature train not bad either. What is more concerning is that the Moving Annual Average of the Miles per Technical Incident is not improving. This affects the TOC’s performance directly. In the first 5 four week periods of this financial year the MAA is:

4365
4693
6386
5003
5267

As a comparison, the Class 22X Voyager/Meridian family show MAAs in the order of 25,000+ miles. Hitachi has a long way to go which suggests that it has not yet got a handle on the problems. From the outside it is not clear whether the causes are design, manufacture, maintenance or operational. In any event Hitachi will need to sharpen up its engineering management if it is ever going to make a profit on the Agility Trains deal.

 

[AlexNL]

As above, the 800s are sadly the DfTs fault. The 802s are GWRs own goal.

GWR needed the 802's to be able to cascade trains to other places and provide improvements or capacity enhancements there. Ordering anything other than more Hitachi EDMU's would have taken longer and would've made the entire operation more complex.

As Clarence Yard stated before: the DfT wouldn't have agreed to that batch of trains if the interior fittings of the 802's was different from the 800's. This would've meant that the improvements in other places wouldn't have happened either.

 

[yorksrob]

I find it surprising that there aren't enough HST's left to substitute for failed 8XX's, rather than sending out short forms. Perhaps they're sending them off lease too quickly.

 

[Master29]

Did you miss post #8730 from CY who is quite involved with the GWR IETs or just choose to ignore it? Just in case here it is again:

I was under the impression the interiors of the 802`s were going to be a different design originally from the iep project so I admit things have changed. You are correct in stating Clarence yard`s close involvement with the IET`s but saying I chose to ignore his post is a bit churlish on your part as you ignored the rest of what I said about so called surveys.

 

[cactustwirly]

I find it surprising that there aren't enough HST's left to substitute for failed 8XX's, rather than sending out short forms. Perhaps they're sending them off lease too quickly.

But that's outside GWRs control.
ScotRail have signed the lease for the HSTs, so GWR have to send them off lease.
There isn't the stabling/maintenace capacity for the HSTs, OOC is virtually non existent, and Landore is virtually closed, therefore all the heavy maintenance has to be carried out at Laira.

 

[yorksrob]

But that's outside GWRs control.
ScotRail have signed the lease for the HSTs, so GWR have to send them off lease.
There isn't the stabling/maintenace capacity for the HSTs, OOC is virtually non existent, and Landore is virtually closed, therefore all the heavy maintenance has to be carried out at Laira.

Scotrail aren't leasing all of them !

 

[JN114]

Scotrail aren't leasing all of them !

They are leasing all the ones that have gone off-lease so far though.

 

[Master29]

A very thoughtful and insightful post by copperthread. I think it says it all but for a few interior gripes that I personally have.

 

[Goldfish62]

As Clarence Yard stated before: the DfT wouldn't have agreed to that batch of trains if the interior fittings of the 802's was different from the 800's. This would've meant that the improvements in other places wouldn't have happened either.

Presumably DafT didn't want the poor specification of the 800s potentially shown up by a TOC specifying something better.

 

[reddragon]

Erm, I think it might have been a joke!

Sarcasm I think!

 

[FGW_DID]

As above, the 800s are sadly the DfTs fault. The 802s are GWRs own goal.

As Clarence Yard stated before: the DfT wouldn't have agreed to that batch of trains if the interior fittings of the 802's was different from the 800's.

CY’s original post was #8730, it was then quoted at post #8844 only just this morning!

 

[Thunderer]

Please stop claiming short forms are "routine".

I think I've suggested it before now, but it really is time you looked up the dictionary definition of routine - or just stopped using the word incorrectly.

Since Hitachi finally made 34 to the 36 five-car Class 800 available for passenger service a few weeks ago, the number of short forms has fallen almost to zero, as there is now some sort of making for faults or routine maintenance.

Perhaps you haven't noticed this, or couldn't care lees, as it would mean you would have to come up with a whole new script - here and on another forum, where you keep repeating the same old lines over and over (which, father_jack, is why some people are so bored with broadgage).

On the last four journeys I have made on Class 800s, the digital seat reservation system has been working fine, which wasn't the case earlier in the year.

"The number of short forms has fallen almost to zero" - not strictly 100% true. I had a 5 coach 800 on the 18:29 off Newport to Swansea two weeks ago on a Friday and it was rammed. Got myself the only 1st Class seat left, full and standing in standard class. Tonight, both the 21:10 and 22:14 services to Swansea off Bristol Parkway are 5 coaches. They'll be "nice and cosy" on a Sunday evening out of Paddington, packed to the rafters. It really was a daft idea to build express trains in 5 car units and while the issues of this happening will ease over time, it will never be totally erradicated.

 

[FGW_DID]

We get it, there are still shortforms happening! These trains aren’t diagrammed for 5 cars, they are diagrammed as 10. If all the units were available from Hitachi, they would be running as the full 10.

Is it really that hard to grasp?

 

[samuelmorris]

We get it, there are still shortforms happening! These trains aren’t diagrammed for 5 cars, they are diagrammed as 10. If all the units were available from Hitachi, they would be running as the full 10.

Is it really that hard to grasp?

No but the counter argument of "there effectively aren't any short forms any more" seems demonstrably false, from the anecdotal evidence I've seen.

The only reason this discussion drags on and is so difficult is the hard & fast attitude taken on both sides.

 

[CMRail]

We get it, there are still shortforms happening! These trains aren’t diagrammed for 5 cars, they are diagrammed as 10. If all the units were available from Hitachi, they would be running as the full 10.

Is it really that hard to grasp?

For some people it seems so.

 

[47271]

The debate has polarised quite badly here it's true. Had the Forum existed 42 years ago - by exchange of Telex presumably - then I'm certain that we would've had the same thing going on. HSTs would've been dismissed as flaky and plasticky with every fault pored over, and seats not lining up with windows, while we would've had the steam and loco hauled diesel eras harked back to - 42 years back from 1976 would've given rise to happy memories from the Golden Age of 1934 after all.

I haven't been terribly complimentary about my experiences on IETs so far - short forms, disappointing levels of cabin noise and vibration, prematurely soiled seat covers and broken down toilets still in service were my most recent comments.

However, I still think they're okay. I don't have a problem with the 'hard' Standard seats which fit me fine. The Standard interiors are a huge improvement on the ghastly GWR HSTs, with plenty of tables to work at and seats lined up with windows. The lighting's fine. The reservation system is great - when it works. So long as I can get a coffee and a sandwich now and again I don't care about the catering arrangements.

First Class is a waste of space but that doesn't matter because Standard does the job for anyone with a laptop and papers.

So they're okay, and will provide an okay service for the next 40 years. Is okay good enough considering how much they've cost and how long they've taken to introduce, particularly considering how brilliant and solid feeling their 140mph UK ancestor, the 395, is? Maybe not, but we've got them now, and we're about to get a whole load more of them, so that'll have to be okay.

 

[samuelmorris]

It's easy for me to criticise strong opinions on the subject as I sit somewhere in the middle, I don't think they're great as reliability is below where it should be 1 year on, noise levels acceptable but vibration rather disappointing, cheap rattly plastics on brand new units a disappointment, saying nothing of the DfT-spec problems like seat firmness, buffet etc. They're far from a disaster though as they will still provide a welcome capacity improvement when all introduced, eliminate wasteful diesel running under overheads, offer superior performance on such sections and don't have the horrendous gangway squealing and bouncy ride a lot of Mk3s suffer from. They're an OK-ish replacement, nothing special.

The disappointment really comes from the fact that I spent 2 1/2 hours on a 395 this weekend as part of Southeastern's Super Saturday promo, and honestly I'd rather be on one of those than an 800 for a similar journey, and the 395s are meant to be commuter trains. Yes I realise the track is better on HS1 but there was far less vibration, less noise at speed, no cheap rattly window blinds, the acceleration is considerably better despite being geared for higher top speed, the seats are far more comfortable and there's still the modern comforts of multiple toilets including disabled accessible ones, a reliable modern PIS, plug sockets between the seats, tables in seatback as well as several full size. This is the same product family, only the commuter version rather than the long-distance, yet it seems not just better specified, but better manufactured as well. How can that be? Don't get me wrong, I've been on a 395 with a loose rattly ceiling panel but it doesn't happen often and the unit was 5 years old at the time.

It's easy to consider the HST the benchmark for long-distance stock based on how revolutionary it was when it was introduced, and there are several reasons why a train originally designed for the market of the late 70s will differ from one that has to meet the load demands of today, but I find drawing negative comparisons between a train and its commuter equivalent on the same platform rather inexcusable.

Software issues like those still plaguing the 800s will eventually be solved I'm sure even if it takes vastly longer than it should, but the units in general just don't have a particularly decent quality of fit & finish. A bit more attention to that would have made so much difference. Presumably after all the extra cost of the Agility Trains idea there was nothing left over to spend on anything else.

I'll reserve judgement until I've been on one and I have my doubts the build quality will be that wonderful but as it stands Anglia's 720s are potentially shaping up to be more comfortable units to spend a long journey on than an 800, and they're 2+3!

 

[SC43090]

"The number of short forms has fallen almost to zero" - not strictly 100% true. I had a 5 coach 800 on the 18:29 off Newport to Swansea two weeks ago on a Friday and it was rammed. Got myself the only 1st Class seat left, full and standing in standard class. Tonight, both the 21:10 and 22:14 services to Swansea off Bristol Parkway are 5 coaches. They'll be "nice and cosy" on a Sunday evening out of Paddington, packed to the rafters. It really was a daft idea to build express trains in 5 car units and while the issues of this happening will ease over time, it will never be totally erradicated.

It seems the lessons from 18 years ago have NOT been learnt that 5 coach trains on inter city services are totally & utterly useless..... As he says in is post the problem will never be totally erradicated.... Just look at the overcrowding on Cross Country that ought to have sounded the warning alarm 18 years ago....

SC43090

 

[yorksrob]

At least this time around, they're starting from the premise of having those five carriage units doubled up, at least some of the way.

It will be interesting to see whether usage generated by a more frequent core service west of Plymouth will lead to trains being doubled up there as well in the long term.

 

[FGW_DID]

No but the counter argument of "there effectively aren't any short forms any more" seems demonstrably false, from the anecdotal evidence I've seen.

The only reason this discussion drags on and is so difficult is the hard & fast attitude taken on both sides.

Nobody has said that there aren’t any short forms any more, there are!

Jimm’s phrase of “fallen almost to zero” still indicates that there is the odd one or two. But it’s not the 6 or 7 shortformed sets that we saw a while ago which affected some 40+ services.

In fact from this mornings Service start up, there are enough units for all the working diagrams so everything that’s diagrammed for 10 cars should have 10 cars on it!

Let’s hope it lasts

 

[bastien]

the acceleration is considerably better despite being geared for higher top speed,

They're both geared for 140mph, aren't they?

 

[Mordac]

They're both geared for 140mph, aren't they?

Indeed, and the 395 isn't lugging diesel engines around.

 

[jimm]

As apposed to constantly praising them as if they were the best thing to hit the rails and completely dis-allow any reasonable criticism of them?

As above, the 800s are sadly the DfTs fault. The 802s are GWRs own goal.

What I also find amusing with this whole project and affair is that it IS possible to design modern trains around the best features of a Mk3. I know that, because that's exactly what Irish Rail did when lead by Dick Fearn when they replaced their Mk3 fleet with the 22000 DMUs. They had the designers look over the Mk3s and I believe conduct real surveys into what Irish Rail passengers wanted. All of the feedback was then fed back into the design and the result was a spacious, light and bright InterCity DMU which included a buffet counter on the longer distance sets. The funny thing about this, is that the company responsible is the same company that born us the Voyager and the 800. The 800s I'll have to just about live with, even if they are frankly not up to scratch as a HST replacement (Quality wise). It's the 802s that I remain highly not impressed with.

As for rubbing your hands with glee for a HST fault on the Cotswolds yesterday. Yes, HSTs fail. Yes, they are old. But could that fault have been detected or prevented if the HST had been berthed in a depot overnight? The 800s seem to have a much more cosy life than the workhorses of the HSTs, with certain mileage per day diagrams and ending up at a Hitachi Depot per night for a service, but the units are still recording issues in service and a fair chunk seem to be software based. For a train that has supposed to have spent well over 2 years in testing before being released to the general public last year, to have undergone over 60 updates and still be having issues, and is still arriving late into service, questions should rightly be raised. And promises and expectations should be questioned. And Given the issue with the 385s, Hitachi have quite rightly now got a mountain to climb to appear reputable again if they want to win further orders in the future.

How is daring to or explain things or question or put counter-arguments to the constant tide of criticism - much of it, yes, repetitive, ignoring frequent attempts that have been made to explain things - supposed to amount to 'constant praise'?

I appreciate that some people don't like the seats, to take one example, but that does not mean that they would like any alternative installation either, does it? Especially given that almost any and every type of seat used on a train in this country for the past four decades is either the best or worst thing ever devised, depending on whose posts you read on this forum.

And perhaps you should read back over the 10 years or so of threads about the IEP project and the resulting trains on this forum and consider some of the things said in them before suggesting that much of what has been said is reasonable.

If Ireland had the traffic volumes the UK does, I have a suspicion they too might just adopt a different approach to interior design on their trains.

Why anyone would expect the 802s to have been radically different from the 800s beats me. The part of the GWR HST fleet nominally allocated to West Country services has always interworked on other routes and the 802s are going to be no different, so some sort of one-off interior was not going to happen.

I was not 'rubbing my hands with glee' over Saturday's incident, simply pointing out that HSTs still can and do run into trouble, as a counterpoint to people instantly seizing upon any and every issue with an IET as some sort of 'proof' of something.

In the case of Saturday's incident, it apparently involved a bird or animal strike affecting brake equipment on the leading power car. It may just be something about West Oxfordshire, as a 180 was disabled at Charlbury when a pigeon strike affected the brakes some years ago.

I seem to recall a recent incident involving an 802 near Devon instantly led to speculation about some sort of fatal flaw with the design of the IET. In the case of the HST, it's apparently just one of those things...

Outstabling of an IET overnight at Worcester started some weeks ago. So far as I know it hasn't refused to play ball starting up in the mornings, despite not getting a dose of mollycoddling by Hitachi engineers.

 

[bastien]

Indeed, and the 395 isn't lugging diesel engines around.

On the other hand, the 395 is lugging around an extra pair of bogies. Length-for-length the 800 seems to win this one.

 

[gingertom]

On the other hand, the 395 is lugging around an extra pair of bogies. Length-for-length the 800 seems to win this one.

don't forget that extra pair of bogies also carts around an additional set of traction motors.

 

[gallafent]

It seems the lessons from 18 years ago have NOT been learnt that 5 coach trains on inter city services are totally & utterly useless

(According to wikipedia) a GWR 5-coach class 802 has 326 seats, a 30% uplift over a 5-coach class 221 super voyager — it's thus “equivalent” to a 6.5 coach voyager. That's quite a lot more capacity

For many lightly loaded / off-peak / end-of-route services, five coaches is clearly plenty. The amount of fresh air carted up and down the cotswold line, west of Swansea, etc., in an HST, demonstrates that. For those sections of route, the five car units are more suitable than anything longer.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

I really want to like the 80x trains.
But a couple of runs today showed them to be rough/heavy/noisy riding, especially over S&C (east and west of Slough for instance, or at the ends of Wantage loops).
I had 800 315 9-car this morning, and it was verging on unpleasant at times.
800 034 back was rather smoother, but it was rough through Chipping Sodbury tunnel.
They also whine a lot when accelerating, more so on electric.
Managed 23 minutes Reading-Paddington start-stop, which is better that anything I can remember on the Up.
Easily picked up 5 minutes lateness from Bath, 4 early into Pad.
The hatched pattern on the 9-car seats was different from the horizontal lines on the 5-car, though still grey and hard.
On the whole I still prefer the ride at 125mph on the 390s/221s.

 

[northernbelle]

How is daring to or explain things or question or put counter-arguments to the constant tide of criticism - much of it, yes, repetitive, ignoring frequent attempts that have been made to explain things - supposed to amount to 'constant praise'?

I appreciate that some people don't like the seats, to take one example, but that does not mean that they would like any alternative installation either, does it? Especially given that almost any and every type of seat used on a train in this country for the past four decades is either the best or worst thing ever devised, depending on whose posts you read on this forum.

And perhaps you should read back over the 10 years or so of threads about the IEP project and the resulting trains on this forum and consider some of the things said in them before suggesting that much of what has been said is reasonable.

If Ireland had the traffic volumes the UK does, I have a suspicion they too might just adopt a different approach to interior design on their trains.

Why anyone would expect the 802s to have been radically different from the 800s beats me. The part of the GWR HST fleet nominally allocated to West Country services has always interworked on other routes and the 802s are going to be no different, so some sort of one-off interior was not going to happen.

I was not 'rubbing my hands with glee' over Saturday's incident, simply pointing out that HSTs still can and do run into trouble, as a counterpoint to people instantly seizing upon any and every issue with an IET as some sort of 'proof' of something.

In the case of Saturday's incident, it apparently involved a bird or animal strike affecting brake equipment on the leading power car. It may just be something about West Oxfordshire, as a 180 was disabled at Charlbury when a pigeon strike affected the brakes some years ago.

I seem to recall a recent incident involving an 802 near Devon instantly led to speculation about some sort of fatal flaw with the design of the IET. In the case of the HST, it's apparently just one of those things...

Outstabling of an IET overnight at Worcester started some weeks ago. So far as I know it hasn't refused to play ball starting up in the mornings, despite not getting a dose of mollycoddling by Hitachi engineers.

Seconded.

I am rather tired of people's opinions being used as factual statements, especially when the 800s are already proving to be more reliable than the HSTs they replace (not much of a benchmark, true) and are already receiving independent customer satisfaction ratings in excess of the HSTs.

The time for HSTs on GWML express trains is over and I know many customers who are pleased to see their replacements in.