Interesting one. My guess is there could have been a fault with the TGS carriage.
Originally they didn't exist anyway, they were only introduced into sets in 1980.
The original reasoning was noise and ride comfort in the rear of the power cars.
The fire system has never covered either the cab or the van.The original reasoning was noise and ride comfort in the rear of the power cars. I would hope the fire extinguishing equipment wasn't set up the same way back then - the poor guard
I thought the bottles were in the former van space?
They are. But the system only discharges into the engine room and clean air compartment. The van is just a convenient area (=there is space) to locate the Inergen bottles.
They are, but the fire suppressant in the bottles is only deployed in the engine compartment if a fire is detected.
Ah, I thought I'd seen it quoted as a reason why a second driver couldn't be there during reversing moves, where a walking route didn't exist, but it may have been why the driver can't walk through himself. ScotRail sets needing turning, I think it was.
My mistaken understanding was similar to TheHovisKid's here:
But thanks for clearing it up.
As I understand it, the original fire system only covered the engine room and not the clean air compartment; it was only when Inergen was fitted that the fire system was extended to cover the clean air compartment. The risk from being in the trailing cab in original configuration would be tiny - the clean air compartment was between the cab and the area covered by the fire extinguishers.
Can I ask what is included in the interface? Knowing that MU guards and drivers communicate from the doors I'm intrigued as to how it works when doing SDO on a HST?
It interfaces the buzzer from the CDL panels (which are wired via separate jumpers only on/between the trailers) into the 36-way multi-jumper. That enables the buzzer to be heard in the cab.
And indeed on the rare occasion that a set ran with two TGS vehicles (an extra one for surfboards during the Boardmasters festival in Newquay was a common arrangement on the western), the equipment had to be isolated in one of them otherwise the buzzer wouldn’t operate in the cabs.
Fabulous, many thanks for that. Good to know how it actually works
On sets meant to have a TGS or sets (such as ScotRail's) that never have them?
On the ex Grand Central sets at EMT/R I believe there was a area in coach A for bikes but I also think at some point bikes were not allowed on these as well maybe before the area was set up?
Well I suppose both. My regular trips are and have been in the Western Region GWR or XC HSTs where I usually take my bike. I am intrigued as to what happens on ScotRail or other HSTs
On ScotRail, there are racks in Coach C - the carrying capacity was increased earlier this year in time for the summer season.