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Northern Unit Refurbishments

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Harvey B

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what do PRM mods include? Is it an accessible toilet and a Passenger Information System or just an accessible toilet?
 
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Harvey B

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CHAPS2034 said:
Makes sense as one of the WMT 323s (217 I think) has just been refurbed with a PRM bog and I believe there is a programme to do the others. Seems daft if they only have a short period left with WMT and then go into storage.
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I guess time will tell about the 323s and I've come down to two possible conclusions and we'll know if Northern are keeping the 323s if either:
1)One of the existing 323s that Northern have go off for a refurbishment and PRM mods.
or
2) When WMT have enough 323s done for PRM mods they may transfer some 323s over to Northern.

And until either of those two things start happening I don't believe the 323s will be staying with northern and another reason is Northern originally promised to refurbish 243 trains. This would take the trains in their refurbishment program up to 260 trains and unless Northern say they're refurbishing 17 extra trains as part of their refurb program I can't see them refurbishing the 323s
 
anamyd

anamyd

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61653 HTAFC said:
  • Accessible toilet.
  • PIS displays
  • Compliant door controls.
  • Colour-contrasting grab poles and handles.
Plus anything else I've missed.
Click to expand...
You've got a lot of the main things, just without detail perhaps. The toilets fitted are not only accessible, but have call for aid facility fitted, and are also controlled emission (have retention tanks) and are vacuum flush (with "easy to see" flush button) rather than water, which is then only used for the sink - not really an accessibility thing but always seems to be included / required and I believe that the early retention toilets with water flush and tank overflow (on 159/0s, Mark 4s, and possibly some later BR EMUs) would have to have been replaced with the more modern ones with vacuum flush and full tank activated lock-out if they had not been already. There are two ways to get a compliant accessible toilet - where there is an existing room (e.g. 158s) - just bring that to spec, and where there isn't, replace the original toilet room and some of the opposite seating with a PRM toilet module (e.g. PRM'd 150s).

The Passenger Information System must include not only interior service information displays and automated announcements, but also exterior destination displays of at least dot matrix type.

Alongside the "easy to see" door controls which, depending on the unit class / carriage type, have to have their open and close buttons swapped so that "open" is lower down, louder door closing alarms and new "door openable" alarms must be fitted.

"Slam door" carriages must have their doors completely replaced with ones of sliding / plug type (these have sealed windows). The exterior door mechanisms on originally sliding / plug door-fitted units / carriages are, if neccessary, replaced with new ones with improved obstacle detection.

The door control mods are not limited to electro-mechanical door controls; e.g. on the PRM'd Transport for Wales 158s the manual handles of the doors of the secondary ("standard" / non-accessible) toilets are painted yellow. On those units, a small modification was also made to the accessible toilets despite them having been refurbished in 2011-2012 including call for aid facility - after the user closes the door from the inside but before they lock it, the "Door Locked" light "now" flashes to remind them to lock the door.

Perhaps an "obvious" thing but which only just occured to me to be fair, is that the wheelchair space must also be to compliant specification; what exactly this involves I don't know as the TfW 158s for example, already had call for aid facility installed to them in 2011-2012 but apparently still needed some slight change which I can't even notice.

For completeness' sake, trains built as long ago as 1998 are PRM 2020-ish compliant (the manufacturers had to look up to 22 years into the future) - for example one subclass of 170 required only a small door step modification to comply, but everything else was there from new, the implementation of some of which is "wrong" but was intended to be right and is not a major problem (some hand rails and the frequency / volume of door alarms being a bit "off") so is "accepted".
 
Last edited:
G

Goldfish62

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anamyd said:
You've got a lot of the main things, just without detail perhaps. The toilets fitted are not only accessible, but have call for aid facility fitted, and are also controlled emission (have retention tanks) and are vacuum flush (with "easy to see" flush button) rather than water, which is then only used for the sink - not really an accessibility thing but always seems to be included / required and I believe that the early retention toilets with water flush and tank overflow (on 159/0s, Mark 4s, and possibly some later BR EMUs) would have to have been replaced with the more modern ones with vacuum flush and full tank activated lock-out if they had not been already. There are two ways to get a compliant accessible toilet - where there is an existing room (e.g. 158s) - just bring that to spec, and where there isn't, replace the original toilet room and some of the opposite seating with a PRM toilet module (e.g. PRM'd 150s).

The Passenger Information System must include not only interior service information displays and automated announcements, but also exterior destination displays of at least dot matrix type.

Alongside the "easy to see" door controls which, depending on the unit class / carriage type, have to have their open and close buttons swapped so that "open" is lower down, louder door closing alarms and new "door openable" alarms must be fitted.

"Slam door" carriages must have their doors completely replaced with ones of sliding / plug type (these have sealed windows). The exterior door mechanisms on originally sliding / plug door-fitted units / carriages are, if neccessary, replaced with new ones with improved obstacle detection.

The door control mods are not limited to electro-mechanical door controls; e.g. on the PRM'd Transport for Wales 158s the manual handles of the doors of the secondary ("standard" / non-accessible) toilets are painted yellow. On those units, a small modification was also made to the accessible toilets despite them having been refurbished in 2011-2012 including call for aid facility - after the user closes the door from the inside but before they lock it, the "Door Locked" light "now" flashes to remind them to lock the door.

Perhaps an "obvious" thing but which only just occured to me to be fair, is that the wheelchair space must also be to compliant specification; what exactly this involves I don't know as the TfW 158s for example, already had call for aid facility installed to them in 2011-2012 but apparently still needed some slight change which I can't even notice.

For completeness' sake, trains built as long ago as 1998 are PRM 2020-ish compliant (the manufacturers had to look up to 22 years into the future) - for example one subclass of 170 required only a small door step modification to comply, but everything else was there from new, the implementation of some of which is "wrong" but was intended to be right and is not a major problem (some hand rails and the frequency / volume of door alarms being a bit "off") so is "accepted".
Click to expand...
There was an about PRM TSI in a recent issue of Today's Railways. It stated that replacement of slam doors is NOT a requirement.

Also to note is that SWR's fully compliant 455s have external roller blinds, not dot matrix/LED.
 
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TEW

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Goldfish62 said:
Also to note is that SWR's fully compliant 455s have external roller blinds, not dot matrix/LED.
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I'd argue they are actually much clearer and easier to read than some of the poor quality LED screens.
 
anamyd

anamyd

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Goldfish62 said:
There was an about PRM TSI in a recent issue of Today's Railways. It stated that replacement of slam doors is NOT a requirement.

Also to note is that SWR's fully compliant 455s have external roller blinds, not dot matrix/LED.
Click to expand...
That's interesting to hear; I wonder why it's not, and why they've been fitted anyway...? Personally I'd consider fitting easier to operate doors a priority over fitting controlled emission toilets, as the former improves accessibility and the latter doesn't (obviously CETs should absolutely be fitted but not over easier to operate doors).

That's surprising, as on the first few TfW 150s with PRM modifications, fitment of the orange LED external displays appears to have been deemed necessary; those units unlike their 158s didn't previously have some partial PRM compliance added before the full PRM mods, with the exception of the "easy to see" door controls, so I assumed that everything added as part of the PRM mods (except the power / USB sockets) was necessary to achieve compliance.
 
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Goldfish62

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anamyd said:
That's interesting to hear; I wonder why it's not, and why they've been fitted anyway...? Personally I'd consider fitting easier to operate doors a priority over fitting controlled emission toilets, as the former improves accessibility and the latter doesn't (obviously CETs should absolutely be fitted but not over easier to operate doors).
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I think the doors issue is more to do with safety and reducing dwell times.
 
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Harvey B

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@507021, I've just seen the fleet news update for February/March and i'm just wondering what has happened with the fleet list
 
Ash Bridge

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158902 observed at Stockport this morning enroute from Leeds Neville Hill to Crewe LNWR, and what appeared to be 158904 in ex works Northern livery spotted passing Reddish South northbound a short while ago.
 
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Geeves

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Can confirm its 904, currently 50 odd early waiting at Guide bridge station junction on the way back to Neville Hill via Huddersfield.
 
507021

507021

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Ash Bridge said:
158902 observed at Stockport this morning enroute from Leeds Neville Hill to Crewe LNWR, and what appeared to be 158904 in ex works Northern livery spotted passing Reddish South northbound a short while ago.
Click to expand...

Thanks for this.
 
leo knight

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Are 158/9 the same spec refurb as the others? In the 2019 stock book no * is indicated as having different seating etc
 
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superkev

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leo knight said:
Are 158/9 the same spec refurb as the others? In the 2019 stock book no * is indicated as having different seating etc
Click to expand...
The 158/9s were bought by wypte who preferred to have only one toilet with the space made available used for bikes.
Not sure how many toilets the prm fitted examples will have.
K
 
anamyd

anamyd

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superkev said:
The 158/9s were bought by wypte who preferred to have only one toilet with the space made available used for bikes.
Not sure how many toilets the prm fitted examples will have.
K
Click to expand...
ahh, the ones that they didn't want to be 158s at all but that was what was in build by then...? Interesting, never knew that - has anyone got any photos showing the lack of accessible toilets on the Northern 158/9s...?
 
SteveyBee131

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anamyd said:
ahh, the ones that they didn't want to be 158s at all but that was what was in build by then...? Interesting, never knew that - has anyone got any photos showing the lack of accessible toilets on the Northern 158/9s...?
Click to expand...
I don't have photos sadly, but they had an accessible toilet, it was the little toilet they didn't have.
 
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