What happened to the Elipsos sleeper stock?

The post is the thread title really! I never had a chance to sample it but the Elipsos Train Hotel stock always looked really nice, did it get broken up when the service was rather shortsightedly discountinued?

Talgo has recently won a contract to convert it into a rather odd high speed train, with new power cars is basically what this article says: https://www.mundocompresor.com/econ...-tren-hotel-composiciones-para-alta-velocidad

Elipsos sleepers were Talgo 6 coaches, from memory, when they ceased around a decade ago.

Were any Talgo 6 (200 km/h) rebuilt as Talgo 7 (250 km/h) or were all Talgo 7 new?

Avril S-107 = S-106 power cars + rebuilt Talgo 7 coaches. Rather odd, indeed.

It may be only refurbished body shells, S-107 is the first 330 km/h-approved variable gauge design so new or rebuilt wheelsets.

Anyone know more about the numbers? From the Trenhotel Talgo 7 sets this needs 13 sets x 12 = 156 coaches.

The Trenhotel sets were longer - from memory around 20 coaches. About 6 sets were needed in service up to 2020 when the last Trenhotel ceased so the numbers (6+spares)x20 roughly match. Other Trenhotel had ceased by around 2015. Either way, these have all been out of use and deteriorating for several years.

The economics of mid-life coaches + new power cars might look better than all-new initially but over the whole life it is probably much worse. Remember why e-Voyager never happened.

nwales58 said:

Elipsos sleepers were Talgo 6 coaches, from memory, when they ceased around a decade ago.

Were any Talgo 6 (200 km/h) rebuilt as Talgo 7 (250 km/h) or were all Talgo 7 new?

Avril S-107 = S-106 power cars + rebuilt Talgo 7 coaches. Rather odd, indeed.

It may be only refurbished body shells, S-107 is the first 330 km/h-approved variable gauge design so new or rebuilt wheelsets.

Anyone know more about the numbers? From the Trenhotel Talgo 7 sets this needs 13 sets x 12 = 156 coaches.

The Trenhotel sets were longer - from memory around 20 coaches. About 6 sets were needed in service up to 2020 when the last Trenhotel ceased so the numbers (6+spares)x20 roughly match. Other Trenhotel had ceased by around 2015. Either way, these have all been out of use and deteriorating for several years.

The economics of mid-life coaches + new power cars might look better than all-new initially but over the whole life it is probably much worse. Remember why e-Voyager never happened.

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It's not the first time RENFE has done it, look at the S130 units. A good portion of those used to be traditional hauled stock, built around 1999, but then in 2007 they built power cars.

Slightly different age difference nowadays, admittedly.

superalbs said:

It's not the first time RENFE has done it, look at the S130 units. A good portion of those used to be traditional hauled stock, built around 1999, but then in 2007 they built power cars.

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Absolutely. As the current mini-cascade will see S-106 release S-130/730 (the Franken-train) to replace hauled Talgo 7 coaches, presumably those coaches will be on offer for yet another rebuild.

Psst. Want a half-used novel articulated train anyone?

Seems so odd that RENFE is going against the flow with night trains seeing a big boom elsewhere.

williamn said:

Seems so odd that RENFE is going against the flow with night trains seeing a big boom elsewhere.

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They're not known for being customer-oriented in general. And that's an understatement.

williamn said:

Seems so odd that RENFE is going against the flow with night trains seeing a big boom elsewhere.

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Typical RENFE. Spain is almost perfect for a night train network, what with very long distances that can only realistically be covered by train or plane. Even the fastest AVE journeys from Malaga to Barcelona take 5.5 hours, with most journeys over 6 hours. It shouldn't be rocket science to have a night train network centred around having departures from Madrid around 10pm, with subsequent arrivals in major destinations (Malaga, Barcelona, Valencia, etc) at around 6-7am, with the night trains starting at the opposite end of the country earlier in the day.

But RENFE really do not exist for any other reason than themselves.

I suspect part of the problem with night trains in Spain is that between IAG (Vueling, Iberia) and Ryanair, the country is more or less served by very cheap plane tickets between distant and not-so distant cities. If you want to go to Barcelona from Malaga in a couple of weeks, a plane ticket will cost you around 15 Euro, whereas a train ticket will cost you quite a lot more. Vueling in particular have a tremendous amount of connections between places that you wouldn't expect to be connected, such as Barcelona-San Sebastian too.

Cloud Strife said:

Typical RENFE. Spain is almost perfect for a night train network, what with very long distances that can only realistically be covered by train or plane. Even the fastest AVE journeys from Malaga to Barcelona take 5.5 hours, with most journeys over 6 hours. It shouldn't be rocket science to have a night train network centred around having departures from Madrid around 10pm, with subsequent arrivals in major destinations (Malaga, Barcelona, Valencia, etc) at around 6-7am, with the night trains starting at the opposite end of the country earlier in the day.

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There is nowhere significant that justifies a 9-hour overnight service from Madrid as the the HSL network nears completion and day trains to major cities take 3 hours or so.
Barcelona-Galicia is the last internal route which could potentially support one. Barcelona-Andalucia might just about with Caley Sleeper levels of subsidy.

30907 said:

There is nowhere significant that justifies a 9-hour overnight service from Madrid as the the HSL network nears completion and day trains to major cities take 3 hours or so.
Barcelona-Galicia is the last internal route which could potentially support one. Barcelona-Andalucia might just about with Caley Sleeper levels of subsidy.

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Indeed. The Spanish government's vision for the high-speed network is to connect all major cities to Madrid within 3 (or is it 4?) hours, and all major cities to Barcelona in 6 hours. With those sorts of journey durations it's difficult to justify a sleeper.

That being said, CS run the Lowlander for journeys that are normally just under 5 hours by daytrain. That allows a very late departure from either end, just before midnight - whereas at the moment the last Spanish high speed departures are around 7-8pm (similar to last departures from London to Glasgow/Scotland).

Watershed said:

... last Spanish high speed departures are around 7-8pm (similar to last departures from London to Glasgow/Scotland).

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Last Madrid-> and <-Barcelona are after 2100 which is suprisingly good in a country where some routes are 4 a day or fewer and cross-country typically 1-2 per day.
To me the only surprise is that OeBB can make sleeper trains break-even rather than guaranteed black hole.

nwales58 said:

Last Madrid-> and <-Barcelona are after 2100 which is suprisingly good in a country where some routes are 4 a day or fewer and cross-country typically 1-2 per day.

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Not so surprising considering that Spanish people „live“ late.

The network described above is almost exactly what there used to be. In fact, 30 years ago there were even two tiers of night train. Estrellas (which ran with conventional coaches) as well as the talgo tenhotels. There was still Motorrail until the early 2000s as well. Chamartin used to be very atmospheric, with multiple overnight services all getting ready to depart after about 10pm.

I managed, variously, to do
Madrid - Bilbao Estrella
Madrid - Barcelona Estrella
Madrid - Granada Estrella

These were a bit rough unless you were able to pay. Seated in open carriages or, worse, compartments overnight was not a lot of fun. On the Granada one, in about 1997, I did manage a compartment. The carriage was single deck but the compartments were interlocked like a game of tetris, with alternate upper and lower arrangements, with beds side by side not like the bunks you get in Talgos (and in the UK).

And
Madrid - Lisbon Trenhotel
Madrid - Paris Trenhotel
Madrid - La Coruña Trenhotel

The latter were superb, with ensuite compartments in Gran Clase, and breakfast and three-course dinner included, along with unlimited drinks from the bar! This was often a challenge on the Lisbon service, where one of the waiting staff was spectacularly unfriendly. A trip on the Lisbon TH was one of only two times I've ever thought I was going to be in an accident on a train, when, somewhere near the border, a wheelset behind us jumped so far in the air it almost threw me out of bed.

DP

30907 said:

There is nowhere significant that justifies a 9-hour overnight service from Madrid as the the HSL network nears completion and day trains to major cities take 3 hours or so.
Barcelona-Galicia is the last internal route which could potentially support one. Barcelona-Andalucia might just about with Caley Sleeper levels of subsidy.

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While that is undoubtedly true, there has never been an objective reason not to run Paris - Madrid, Madrid - Lisbon and the Sud Express night trains anymore, except for RENFE unwillingness.