Tilting

flypie · 16 Sep 2014

What does it take for a line to be cleared for tilting? How much effort/equipment is involved?

And as an auxiliary question does any one know how long it actually takes a Pendolino to make the Stafford Nuneaton trip? Not bothered about stopping.

RailUK Forums

dave_wm · 16 Sep 2014

flypie said:
And as an auxiliary question does any one know how long it actually takes a Pendolino to make the Stafford Nuneaton trip? Not bothered about stopping.

Can answer your second question. Non-stop Pendolino timings for Stafford - Nuneaton appear to be 20 minutes, for example 1A21, the 0955 Manchester Piccadilly to London Euston.

thenorthern · 16 Sep 2014

flypie said:
What does it take for a line to be cleared for tilting? How much effort/equipment is involved?

And as an auxiliary question does any one know how long it actually takes a Pendolino to make the Stafford Nuneaton trip? Not bothered about stopping.

Not sure about Stafford to Nuneaton, the London-Glasgow, Chester and Manchester trains are quicker than the London to Liverpool ones as the former don't call at Stafford.

The technology is quite complex a Tilt Authorisation and Speed Supervision System (TASS) needs to be installed which costs a lot of money to install hence why the only tilting trains are on the West Coast Mainline. There was a TASS installed between Banbury and Oxford however it was removed as it wasn't worth CrossCountry keeping it as their trains could only tilt there and some sections between Birmingham and Manchester which made it uneconomical to retain.

flypie · 16 Sep 2014

dave_wm said:
Can answer your second question. Non-stop Pendolino timings for Stafford - Nuneaton appear to be 20 minutes, for example 1A21, the 0955 Manchester Piccadilly to London Euston.

Ta. The DMUs take 39 minutes to the journey with 4 stops. Just trying to do fanstasy train planning on. https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BzqZlKsgcriVbFl0X1pJckoxbEE/edit?usp=sharing
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

thenorthern said:
Not sure about Stafford to Nuneaton, the London-Glasgow, Chester and Manchester trains are quicker than the London to Liverpool ones as the former don't call at Stafford.

The technology is quite complex a Tilt Authorisation and Speed Supervision System (TASS) needs to be installed which costs a lot of money to install hence why the only tilting trains are on the West Coast Mainline. There was a TASS installed between Banbury and Oxford however it was removed as it wasn't worth CrossCountry keeping it as their trains could only tilt there and some sections between Birmingham and Manchester which made it uneconomical to retain.

I was just trying to work out what would be the ultimate speed you could get on a Birmingham to Norwich, which is quite bendy in places,

thenorthern · 16 Sep 2014

flypie said:
I was just trying to work out what would be the ultimate speed you could get on a Birmingham to Norwich, which is quite bendy in places,

Now that would be a fun journey to do on a Pendo.

I think Pendolinos have a design speed of 140 MPH although as the WCML doesn't have in cab signalling hence why their maximum speed is 125 MPH.

flypie · 16 Sep 2014

thenorthern said:
Now that would be a fun journey to do on a Pendo.

I think Pendolinos have a design speed of 140 MPH although as the WCML doesn't have in cab signalling hence why their maximum speed is 125 MPH.

You need moving block for 140. I was think more super voyager. Just by patching together existing services and taking away waiting on the platform you can knock over 1 hour of the current bast time.

Direct Service Via London
Lvl->Nrw Nrw->Lvl Lvl-Nrw Nrw->Lvl
Dep 06:47:00 15:48:00 05:27:00 18:30:00
Arrive 12:15:00 21:36:00 10:50:00 23:33:00
05:28:00 05:48:00 05:23:00 05:03:00
Time in Norwich 03:33:00 07:40:00

Down to 4:22 take out 10 superfluous station and knock of another 30 minutes. Minus the 10 minutes you just gave me your down to 3:42. Already the Ely Nrw line has been speeded up but not in tables. The slowest section is Peterborough Ely which is of course the straightest bits. 2 complete straight line and 70mph max.
I reckon using the Ely avoiding loops could remove another 2, and some passing loops beyond Nuneaton even without titling you might just make 3 hours.
and before you ask yes I am bored and have to much time on my hands,

Carlisle · 16 Sep 2014

thenorthern said:
There was a TASS installed between Banbury and Oxford however it was removed as it wasn't worth CrossCountry keeping it as their trains could only tilt there and some sections between Birmingham and Manchester which made it uneconomical to retain.

Did Virgin cross country origionally have any hopes or plans to extend tilting for its class 221s to other lines apart from the WCML or that experimental short section mentioned above?
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

thenorthern said:
The technology is quite complex a Tilt Authorisation and Speed Supervision System (TASS) needs to be installed which costs a lot of money .

Does the more generous European loading gauge allow their tilting trains to operate without the need for installing all the trackside balises etc that make our TASS system so costly to commission ?

thenorthern · 16 Sep 2014

Carlisle said:
Did Virgin cross country origionally have any hopes or plans to extend tilting for its class 221s to other lines apart from the WCML or that experimental short section mentioned above?

Not sure, at the time the South coast trains joined up to the Birmingham - Scottish trains which are now the London to Glasgow/Edinburgh via Birmingham services so it made sense as tilting could also be utilised more. I would have thought Virgin Cross Country would have wanted to extend tilting up the main Cross Country route had they of won in 2007 but I don't recall it being mentioned in their franchise application.

Carlisle · 16 Sep 2014

thenorthern said:
Not sure, at the time the South coast trains joined up to the Birmingham - Scottish trains which are now the London to Glasgow/Edinburgh via Birmingham services so it made sense as tilting could also be utilised more. I would have thought Virgin Cross Country would have wanted to extend tilting up the main Cross Country route had they of won in 2007 but I don't recall it being mentioned in their franchise application.

Cheers for explaining things , The few times I travelled between Oxford and Banbury on a 221 in Virgin XC days ,the tilt never seemed to be working giving the impression their XC side had lost interest in expanding the concept at all towards the end of its term , however as you say it might have been different if they had won the next franchise

swt_passenger · 16 Sep 2014

Carlisle said:
Cheers for explaining things , The few times I travelled between Oxford and Banbury on a 221 in Virgin XC days ,the tilt never seemed to be working giving the impression their XC side had lost interest in expanding the concept at all towards the end of its term , however as you say it might have been different if they had won the next franchise

I always thought the sectional timings didn't need the tilt to be used, because they could not guarantee any particular service would always be formed of 220 or 221.

Carlisle · 16 Sep 2014

swt_passenger said:
I always thought the sectional timings didn't need the tilt to be used, because they could not guarantee any particular service would always be formed of 220 or 221.

Yes I think I have heard that too,which makes me wonder what Virgins origional operating plan was when ordering half the fleet with and half without tilt

jopsuk · 16 Sep 2014

as well as the physical clearance issues and electronic equipment, the track itself needs to be built to a suitable standard for high speed running.

The Planner · 16 Sep 2014

swt_passenger said:
I always thought the sectional timings didn't need the tilt to be used, because they could not guarantee any particular service would always be formed of 220 or 221.

We do have the ability to differentiate between the two as we have SRTs for both 220, 221 and 221 tilting.

swt_passenger · 16 Sep 2014

The Planner said:
We do have the ability to differentiate between the two as we have SRTs for both 220, 221 and 221 tilting.

I can see that, but IIRC the public facing timetable showed 'clock face' times either side of the Oxford - Banbury section, so presumably even if a 221 with tilt was faster over the section it would just sit in a platform longer to meet the next departure time?

Probably should not have used 'sectional' in the above post. as it has a specific meaning...

edwin_m · 16 Sep 2014

I think the original Virgin Trains plan was to use tilt on the Birmingham-Reading trains, many of which continued to Glasgow where tilt could be used again. This is the reason for ordering a mixed fleet of 220s and 221s. However when "Operation Princess" was introduced it proved to be unworkable and the service disintegrated for a few months. I suspect that the abandonment of faster 221 timings around Banbury was one of the changes made to recover this situation.

The Planner · 16 Sep 2014

Just checked what is in for Banbury to Oxford and there was no difference between the tilt/non tilt timings going back as far as 2002.

thenorthern · 16 Sep 2014

The Planner said:
Just checked what is in for Banbury to Oxford and there was no difference between the tilt/non tilt timings going back as far as 2002.

I think that would be because they couldn't guarantee the type of train used.

This is a news article for the time.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/oxfordshire/3666933.stm

I know they had to completely re-build the line from Colwich Junction to Manchester via Stoke-on-Trent to accommodate tilting trains which took several months in 2003 and caused a lot of disruption.I am not sure if they ever re-built Norton Bridge to Stone but that section is no longer used by tilting trains.

flypie · 16 Sep 2014

thenorthern said:
Not sure about Stafford to Nuneaton, the London-Glasgow, Chester and Manchester trains are quicker than the London to Liverpool ones as the former don't call at Stafford.

The technology is quite complex a Tilt Authorisation and Speed Supervision System (TASS) needs to be installed which costs a lot of money to install hence why the only tilting trains are on the West Coast Mainline. There was a TASS installed between Banbury and Oxford however it was removed as it wasn't worth CrossCountry keeping it as their trains could only tilt there and some sections between Birmingham and Manchester which made it uneconomical to retain.

Will the arrival of GSM(r) and possible thing like ETCS Level 2 make tilting cheaper to implement?
Secondary lines like the Birmingham - Peterborough make ideal elements for an East-West Bristol to Norwich line. It alignment means that tilting would be a real speed boost, but it's never going to get the traffic of WCML.

Click here for map

MarkyT · 16 Sep 2014

thenorthern said:
I think that would be because they couldn't guarantee the type of train used.

This is a news article for the time.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/oxfordshire/3666933.stm

I know they had to completely re-build the line from Colwich Junction to Manchester via Stoke-on-Trent to accommodate tilting trains which took several months in 2003 and caused a lot of disruption.I am not sure if they ever re-built Norton Bridge to Stone but that section is no longer used by tilting trains.

The tilting units also had much heavier bogies, which with the tilt actuation systems added around 4 tonnes or so to each car's weight. With the same installed power, that resulted in more sluggish performance and the tilters took longer to reach the slightly higher maximum speed. For short hops between stations typical on the Cross Country network, the poorer acceleration cancelled out any time savings the higher top speed tilting allowed. The heavier bogies had, and still have to be carted around whatever speed the units they are fitted to are allowed to do at all points on their journeys.

I noted a 4-car Voyager in Devon over the weekend with three cars sporting the lightweight 220 style bogies, together with one having the heavier ex-tilting bogies. Perhaps it would make sense to mix all units in this way in order to equalise performance.

swt_passenger · 16 Sep 2014

MarkyT said:
I noted a 4-car Voyager in Devon over the weekend with three cars sporting the lightweight 220 style bogies, together with one having the heavier ex-tilting bogies.

That's a known temporary formation however, because of the missing vehicle undergoing repairs following fire damage - I reckon it will be reformed afterwards.

MarkyT · 16 Sep 2014

swt_passenger said:
That's a known temporary formation however, because of the missing vehicle undergoing repairs following fire damage - I reckon it will be reformed afterwards.

Thanks for that - something I wasn't aware of. It does suggest mix'n'match formations could be possible though. I was involved in an infrastructure study for the 22x introduction under Virgin, and on the Thames Valley - Birmingham route there was no appreciable difference in point to point timings between the two variants, unless you cut out stops, and even then the difference was marginal. I fully understand why Cross Country decommissioned and removed the tilting capability on their portion of the 221 fleet, but unfortunately those extra 40 or 48 tonnes of bogie weight per unit will have to be carried around for the rest of the trains' lives. That is as much as an extra trailer car, which would have been a lot more use!

Minilad · 16 Sep 2014

With regards to the tilting section between Banbury and Oxford. There was never any speed differential for tilt or non tilt unlike some sections between Stoke and Macclesfield for example. So there was no timing benefit to the tilting section. It was more about being used as a proving ground

MarkyT · 16 Sep 2014

Minilad said:
With regards to the tilting section between Banbury and Oxford. There was never any speed differential for tilt or non tilt unlike some sections between Stoke and Macclesfield for example. So there was no timing benefit to the tilting section. It was more about being used as a proving ground

That may have been the case with TASS as installed, but I recall when our track engineers looked at the upgrade scheme for Thames Valley - Birmingham, in theory there were a few places where small gains in maximum speed would have been possible for the tilters. Timings used now are fairly slack and clearly assume the heavier units travelling at non tilt speed, but the lighter units were able to accelerate a little faster and could very nearly match the section times of the (heavier) tilters that would have been exploiting the slightly faster maximum speed that tilting might in theory have allowed. Most of the TASS project was managed by West Coast route modernisation whose main priority was getting it all working with pendolinos. I wasn't involved with the WCRM areas, and the Thames Valley route was the only section Virgin Cross Country considered worthwhile fitting away from the shared sections that were to be equipped for West Coast pendolinos anyway.

Railsigns · 16 Sep 2014

flypie said:
You need moving block for 140.

You don't need moving block but you do need cab signalling.

thenorthern · 16 Sep 2014

Does anyone else find it strange how unlike most first world countries who built new dedicated high speed lines for their inter-city trains Great Britain has just continued to use its old lines where the tracks are shared with both commuter and local stopping trains and infrastructure is just upgraded when required.

flypie · 16 Sep 2014

thenorthern said:
Does anyone else find it strange how unlike most first world countries who built new dedicated high speed lines for their inter-city trains Great Britain has just continued to use its old lines where the tracks are shared with both commuter and local stopping trains and infrastructure is just upgraded when required.

No. There are 2 models improve your track or improve your train. Japan/France went with 1 Italy and the UK the other. In reality you eventually need to do both. What is appalling is who we haven't upgraded the signalling and management system, eventually it will have to be RF/GSM(r) based but no preparations are being made, even simple ones.

What I find strange is that while we go for HS2 we know that most current freight cannot run on it because they cannot verify there own integrity and ETCS3 requires that. Surely the sensible thing is to require all new freight stock to be able to self verify or have a known route to self verification.

I'd also like to see what happens if you put system like the self driving car into trains.

MCR247 · 16 Sep 2014

thenorthern said:
Does anyone else find it strange how unlike most first world countries who built new dedicated high speed lines for their inter-city trains Great Britain has just continued to use its old lines where the tracks are shared with both commuter and local stopping trains and infrastructure is just upgraded when required.

Maybe thats because as much as people like to look at other countries and compare, no two countries are the same and therefore no two countries have the same requirements... :roll:

It is a lot easier to justify building HS rail when you have very big cities very far apart with very little between them i.e France. It is a lot more difficult to justify HS rail when you have big cities, but with a load of places of a decent size that "cant" be left out, i.e. England*

*Not that i'm anti-HS2, I'm just saying that is why it isn't as much of an obvious decision as it probably would be elsewhere

PermitToTravel · 16 Sep 2014

flypie said:
I'd also like to see what happens if you put system like the self driving car into trains.

Nothing? The existing systems for driverless trains are very very different to the systems in development for self-driving cars. The former communicate directly with the signalling system, and the latter use cameras and scanners to look at the road.

edwin_m · 16 Sep 2014

flypie said:
No. There are 2 models improve your track or improve your train. Japan/France went with 1 Italy and the UK the other. In reality you eventually need to do both. What is appalling is who we haven't upgraded the signalling and management system, eventually it will have to be RF/GSM(r) based but no preparations are being made, even simple ones.

What I find strange is that while we go for HS2 we know that most current freight cannot run on it because they cannot verify there own integrity and ETCS3 requires that. Surely the sensible thing is to require all new freight stock to be able to self verify or have a known route to self verification.

I'd also like to see what happens if you put system like the self driving car into trains.

As well as being the home of the Pendolino, Italy has also built quite a length of high speed line and actually opened their first section before the French.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-speed_rail_in_Italy

I wasn't aware of the self-verification issue (can a smart tail lamp do this?) but in any case it isn't relevant as HS2 is only planning to use ERTMS level 2.

http://www.hs2.org.uk/news-resources/foi/foi11-248-technical-evidence

Apart from engineering trains, freight use of HS2 is pretty unlikely. It would involve a huge amount of hassle for single line access during a few hours each night, and with no HS2-HS1 link the primary reason of getting UIC gauge wagons beyond Dagenham doesn't apply anyway.

flypie · 16 Sep 2014

Fahad said:
Nothing? The existing systems for driverless trains are very very different to the systems in development for self-driving cars. The former communicate directly with the signalling system, and the latter use cameras and scanners to look at the road.

I know they are very different which is why I would like to see what happens if you where to use a similar system on trains. They would also have the advantage at spotting track obstructions and trespassers.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

edwin_m said:
As well as being the home of the Pendolino, Italy has also built quite a length of high speed line and actually opened their first section before the French.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-speed_rail_in_Italy

I wasn't aware of the self-verification issue (can a smart tail lamp do this?) but in any case it isn't relevant as HS2 is only planning to use ERTMS level 2.

http://www.hs2.org.uk/news-resources/foi/foi11-248-technical-evidence

Apart from engineering trains, freight use of HS2 is pretty unlikely. It would involve a huge amount of hassle for single line access during a few hours each night, and with no HS2-HS1 link the primary reason of getting UIC gauge wagons beyond Dagenham doesn't apply anyway.

HS2 have already talked bout upgrading to ETCS 3 to get more out of the system. HS2 will only be the start of ETCS3 it offers advantages everywhere, long after I'm dead something similar will cover the entire network. Part of HS2 use will to be increase redundancy. Being able to move freight over for even a short time would enable work on other lines. Having a known route to self verification would be a lot cheaper the actually installing it.

The problem with the smart tail light how do you actually know it is at the end? You also need a cable connection all the way through the train. Then of course if your reordering a train or deleting or adding wagons, how do you know it's at the end? It sound simple but the deeper you look the more complex.
Does anyone know if ETCS3 allows closer running for slow trains? Is the block size based on velocity and braking power?

Tilting

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