Is your Zollner LOWS equitment collecting dust??

[Tin Rocket]

Network rail outlayed a tidy sum on this mobile LOWS equitment some say hundreds of thousands of pounds,our 2 kits are just gathering dust and cluttering up the stores and have been for the last 2 years or so,do other delivery units use theirs??

 

[Hydro]

Never even seen it. We never got any LOWS kit, it was always said it was under test. Wasn't it quite unreliable due to the radio frequencies?

 

[Tin Rocket]

Never even seen it. We never got any LOWS kit, it was always said it was under test. Wasn't it quite unreliable due to the radio frequencies?

yes ours were failing safe 8 times out of 10 when we started using them,they were binned awaiting modifications,but 2 years down the line...

 

[DaveNewcastle]

I remember seeing these units in an electronics industry sales brochure and thought: that's a very simple concept, designed in a very simple way, fragile in their electronic environment and implemented with a naieve assumption about their intended environment; but built into an expensive and robust system which is quite out of proportion to what they actually do (and even more worrying, what they migt not be able to do).
Or in plain english, a Good idea, badly implemented.

But I never realised that NR had bought them and had rolled them out across the network.

To be fair, though, surely a system which was even simpler to set up but much much more immune to error, could be a real benefit in reducing posessions or increasing the fulfillment of minor works, or am I wrong?

 

[Hydro]

To be fair, though, surely a system which was even simpler to set up but much much more immune to error, could be a real benefit in reducing posessions or increasing the fulfillment of minor works, no?

There have been lookouts aids around for years, one old system was PeeWee, which was basically LOWS but using wires run out to the lookout. The lookout held a handset which sounded an alarm when a pressel was released (fail safe). Apparently it took ages to set up and the wires were prone to being damaged or broken.

Nothing seems to beat the old flags when used correctly, except for complicated fixed systems like ATWS which is complex and practically needs a possession to install, or TOWS which is actually integrated into the signalling system.

 

[TheSlash]

Had my LOWS course for Lookout and COSS binned.
Alot of people complained about it being heavy and over sensitive?

 

[Hydro]

The site warning kit looks like a handful in itself. The radio frequencies were apparently prone to interference, leading to a lot of false alarms.