Porterbrook Cl.769 'Flex' trains from 319s, initially for Northern

[RichardTBC]

Realtime Trains - 3Z15 1152 Preston to Edge Hill Depot

Realtime Trains provides live realtime running information for the Great British railway network using open data.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

Class 769s back out again today?

 

[physics34]

I can confirm 319 cabs get very hot and the shape of the window does not provide much ventilation, compared to old slam door stock when a driver could put his elbow out of the window etc etc. Air con is certainly essential now.

 

[jonesy3001]

Realtime Trains - 3Z15 1152 Preston to Edge Hill Depot

Realtime Trains provides live realtime running information for the Great British railway network using open data.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

Class 769s back out again today?

Was 195131 on this run

 

[OTRail]

I can’t imagine the air con issue impacting the GWR units - I believe their 769/9s are being refurbished to include air conditioning so no doubt the cabs will be included.

 

[XAM2175]

Should have called them 319/5s!

I'm inclined to think that the rationale for refusing to grandfather the cabs is that the units have just undergone major modifications that make them substantially different to the originals, rather than any semantics about the TOPS classification.

 

[Ribbleman]

Realtime Trains - 3Z15 1152 Preston to Edge Hill Depot

Realtime Trains provides live realtime running information for the Great British railway network using open data.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

Class 769s back out again today?

The 769s are at Springs Branch and Allerton rather than Edge Hill.

 

[Brissle Girl]

However a quality built car will last 30 years with good care & maintenance, my 1998 Mercedes C230 is to my mind as good as anything I could buy now and I doubt the build quality would match.

I suspect if you were to pop into your local Merc dealer you would find that the safety features on the current equivalent model are incomparable with a 22 year old car. And there would be significant improvements in environmental performance too, as well as technology such as navigation aids, and connectivity.

And that will be true of any car manufacturer, not just high end ones.

 

[supervc-10]

Given how much rust most '90s Mercs had, and the biodegradable wiring harnesses, I'd wager that a modern car will on average outlast a '98 C-Class!

And the technology even on low-end cars these days is incredible. I drive a 2019 Seat Ibiza, it has radar cruise control, full LED lights, satnav with bluetooth and screen mirroring, and a digital LED screen for the instruments. In a mass-market supermini!

 

[XCTurbostar]

Video posted on Twitter of a depot movement of an 8car TfW 769 - https://twitter.com/foxy_michael/status/1238237116036984833?s=21

 

[Jamesrob637]

Video posted on Twitter of a depot movement of an 8car TfW 769 - https://twitter.com/foxy_michael/status/1238237116036984833?s=21

Pardon me but that video is from March?

 

[XCTurbostar]

My apologies, I saw it on a Facebook page shared about 2 hours ago! That’ll teach me!

 

[Jamesrob637]

My apologies, I saw it on a Facebook page shared about 2 hours ago! That’ll teach me!

Ironically that's still about their maximum speed.

Still, at least at 3mph the cab won't be too noisy to not hear the AWS

 

[Bob Price]

They did get a four car up the Rhymney valley a few times before lockdown. They have four units sitting in Canton doing nothing. Don't know if I shared this in this group but this is one under test.

 

[ed1971]

I suspect if you were to pop into your local Merc dealer you would find that the safety features on the current equivalent model are incomparable with a 22 year old car. And there would be significant improvements in environmental performance too, as well as technology such as navigation aids, and connectivity.

And that will be true of any car manufacturer, not just high end ones.

Yes, newer cars have better safety features but at the cost of smaller windows, resulting in blind spots everywhere and woefully inadequate all round visibility. This is at a time when roads are busier with more vehicles, cyclists and pedestrians, making good visibility even more important than ever. Four years ago, I changed my Rover 75 estate for a VW Passat B5.5 because of this and have been a lot happier.

Being from an engineering background, (qualified to HND in Electrical & Electronic Engineering), I am very sceptical about all the mod cons in recent cars. A few years down the line, when the vehicle has been exposed to the elements for some time, there is a lot more to go wrong, likely needing specialist equipment to find and rectify the fault(s).
It reminds me of an annoyance with my first car. The driver's door window motor would intermittently not work. I rectified the problem by fitting a manual winder mechanism from a scrap car and was very happy with the result, as I could open the window when I wanted to!

 

[samuelmorris]

This is heading off on a bit of a tangent, but being from a family that has repaired cars for a living, it's becoming somewhat unsustainable now - I've no idea how long independents will be able to keep trading because the throwaway culture of manufacturers is making life increasingly difficult. In the rail industry, however, stuff has to last and be maintained so there's no sense engineering stuff to be disposable.

 

[hobbm013]

Transport for Wales have had 6 units delivered now, with 3 more to come

 

[Peter Sarf]

This is heading off on a bit of a tangent, but being from a family that has repaired cars for a living, it's becoming somewhat unsustainable now - I've no idea how long independents will be able to keep trading because the throwaway culture of manufacturers is making life increasingly difficult. In the rail industry, however, stuff has to last and be maintained so there's no sense engineering stuff to be disposable.

Yes. For example my 1994 Vauxhall Carlton (its from the factory that made the Opel Omaga B btw !). There is a lot less to go wrong and most of it is easily repaired or replaced. Even has a standard sized slot for the radio. I really dread the possibility of having to keep a modern car going !. Because the car has been very very reliable I am prepared to spend when it needs something expensive repairing. It has little residual value and I cannot see the cost of many major jobs exceeding the cost of depreciation I would incur with a new car.

In the past railway trains have been built to last. But I wonder if the latest trains will be so long lived. We seem to be throwing a lot of electric trains away after a short life currently ?.

 

[Wyrleybart]

In the past railway trains have been built to last. But I wonder if the latest trains will be so long lived. We seem to be throwing a lot of electric trains away after a short life currently ?.

Trains are still built to last, and it is feasible to keep older trains in use. Class 150s date from 1984 / 1985 and AFAIK there are no plans to withdraw any of them in the next four years. That takes the up to their fourtieth birthdays. Similar HSTs overhauled for Scotrail and GWR are still coming out of WABTEC with no end date for traffic, which should take them well past fifty.

The problem is that DfT are tinkering / have tinkered with franchise plans, which have disrupted the life of train fleets. it was decided that Thameslink needed a fleet of new trains so 319s were replaced earlier in their careers. These have found reuse with some TOCs although I havn't figured out why 321s were replaced by 319s on the peak hour Euston-Tring service.

 

[Peter Sarf]

Trains are still built to last, and it is feasible to keep older trains in use. Class 150s date from 1984 / 1985 and AFAIK there are no plans to withdraw any of them in the next four years. That takes the up to their fourtieth birthdays. Similar HSTs overhauled for Scotrail and GWR are still coming out of WABTEC with no end date for traffic, which should take them well past fifty.

The problem is that DfT are tinkering / have tinkered with franchise plans, which have disrupted the life of train fleets. it was decided that Thameslink needed a fleet of new trains so 319s were replaced earlier in their careers. These have found reuse with some TOCs although I havn't figured out why 321s were replaced by 319s on the peak hour Euston-Tring service.

IIRC Lease was up on those 321s and a new TOC for them had been found so Euston-Tring lost them.

I was agonising over all the 321s and 317s that are being prematurely replaced and worse still the newer 379s. Seems the Dft has encouraged this on Anglia.

Thameslink is a bit of a special case. To make best use of the extensive (but as yet unproven) capacity improvements a larger fleet was inevitable. It was decided this should all be of one type of train so that they had identical performance - otherwise everything would be held up by the slowest design on what is now an intensive urban service. So it made some sense. This left 319s, 377/5s and 387s spare. The 377/5s have gone to South Eastern. The irony is that the 387s have effectively made 365s spare and Great Western did not take them but also got 387s iirc.

A decent few pieces of suburban electrification would soak up all those 317, 321 & 365 EMUs - but there is a thread on that somewhere. Instead we have a looming DMU shortage - enter the 769s maybe...

 

[PHILIPE]

Transport for Wales have had 6 units delivered now, with 3 more to come

They are being discussed here:-

Transport for Wales 769's

Not for about a month now Thanks, I couldn't remember seeing reports anywhere.

www.railforums.co.uk

 

[Domh245]

why 321s were replaced by 319s on the peak hour Euston-Tring service.

They went to Scotland, and are running around Glasgow (minus a carriage) as Class 320s

I was agonising over all the 321s and 317s that are being prematurely replaced and worse still the newer 379s. Seems the Dft has encouraged this on Anglia.

The oldest 317s are getting on for 40, whilst the youngest are 34 - by all conventional wisdom they are now 'life-expired' - the 321s are between 32 and 29 years old - not quite life expired but at the same time, you'd only expect another 10 years from them. 379s are a modern unit, granted but I wouldn't be surprised to see them found a home before too long - being a variant of the most populous rolling stock family helps them there.

The real 'issue' is that new rolling stock is comparatively cheap and has a whole host of benefits for both passengers and staff (Air Conditioning, more efficient, easier diagnostics of issues, etc) so it's quite frankly stupid not to go for new stock when you can, particularly when accompanied by benefits such as creating uniform fleets.

 

[Speed43125]

The irony is that the 387s have effectively made 365s spare and Great Western did not take them but also got 387s iirc.

I agree the decision to order new trains for the Great Western Electrification seemed rather wasteful given 365s are effectively free and otherwise only rotting away.

A decent few pieces of suburban electrification would soak up all those 317, 321 & 365 EMUs - but there is a thread on that somewhere. Instead we have a looming DMU shortage - enter the 769s maybe...

Where are we imagining? Chiltern perhaps? the stock there is not really life expired, so I'd struggle to justify that. Obviously somewhere along the Northern Franchise might make sense, but that runs into political difficulty introducing cascaded stock (365s perhaps notwithstanding). Politics matter and given the GW ship has sailed I can't see a future for any of the stuff beyond the odd stop gap a la scotrail 365, which is why porterbrook have come up with the 769 project in the first place.

 

[anthony263]

If we see more wires in south Wales etc then perhaps a home could be found for the 365s

 

[Bikeman78]

They went to Scotland, and are running around Glasgow (minus a carriage) as Class 320s



The oldest 317s are getting on for 40, whilst the youngest are 34 - by all conventional wisdom they are now 'life-expired' - the 321s are between 32 and 29 years old - not quite life expired but at the same time, you'd only expect another 10 years from them. 379s are a modern unit, granted but I wouldn't be surprised to see them found a home before too long - being a variant of the most populous rolling stock family helps them there.

The real 'issue' is that new rolling stock is comparatively cheap and has a whole host of benefits for both passengers and staff (Air Conditioning, more efficient, easier diagnostics of issues, etc) so it's quite frankly stupid not to go for new stock when you can, particularly when accompanied by benefits such as creating uniform fleets.

Electric trains can more or less go on for ever if the bodyshells don't rust. The Belgians have EMUs dating from 1966 and the Dutch have EMUs dating from 1975. They are both starting to be replaced but they still get people from A to B reliably.

 

[geoffk]

I agree the decision to order new trains for the Great Western Electrification seemed rather wasteful given 365s are effectively free and otherwise only rotting away.


Where are we imagining? Chiltern perhaps? the stock there is not really life expired, so I'd struggle to justify that. Obviously somewhere along the Northern Franchise might make sense, but that runs into political difficulty introducing cascaded stock (365s perhaps notwithstanding). Politics matter and given the GW ship has sailed I can't see a future for any of the stuff beyond the odd stop gap a la scotrail 365, which is why porterbrook have come up with the 769 project in the first place.

Felixstowe or Sudbury?

 

[Speed43125]

Felixstowe or Sudbury?

Both of which are now 755 operated, and neither are particularly busy.
Felixstowe obviously has the goods traffic to justify it but that's digressing.

 

[edwin_m]

Electric trains can more or less go on for ever if the bodyshells don't rust. The Belgians have EMUs dating from 1966 and the Dutch have EMUs dating from 1975. They are both starting to be replaced but they still get people from A to B reliably.

They can certainly be long-lived - many of the Underground fleets lasted around half a century. More recent fleets have solid state control and simpler three-phase motors, which ought to last longer with no moving parts but may be affected by obsolescence and inability to obtain spare parts.

 

[gallafent]

And the technology even on low-end cars these days is incredible. I drive a 2019 Seat Ibiza, it has radar cruise control, full LED lights, satnav with bluetooth and screen mirroring, and a digital LED screen for the instruments. In a mass-market supermini!

Had a current model Yaris as a courtesy car the other day. Many similar features, but I was moderately astonished to find that it had manual air-con rather than what I thought was now standard “press «auto» and set the temperature” system (per my old 1996 Subaru or current 2007 Prius, for example). It had various other magical systems so I thought that omission quite odd. Does the more automatic system really cost more than the extra knobs and dials required for the manual system, I wondered, or is it just some deliberate segmentation to tempt people towards more expensive models. I wonder, do train cab air-con systems allow one simply to “set a temperature” in that way, or are they more primitive in general?

 

[JonathanH]

I agree the decision to order new trains for the Great Western Electrification seemed rather wasteful given 365s are effectively free and otherwise only rotting away.

I'm not sure that it is as simple as you suggest - 387s can run at 110mph on the main line and in the peaks there are hardly any 'with flow' GWR services on the relief lines inside Maidenhead. I accept that 110mph over 20 miles doesn't save that much time but having a mixed fleet of 387s and 365s wouldn't have been as efficient as the all-387 option.

Ironic that we then end up with older 769s operating on GWR but they aren't going on the main line.

 

[AM9]

They can certainly be long-lived - many of the Underground fleets lasted around half a century. More recent fleets have solid state control and simpler three-phase motors, which ought to last longer with no moving parts but may be affected by obsolescence and inability to obtain spare parts.

Indeed, the principle of EMU longevity was demonstrated to extreme levels by the Southern Railway's practices. The rapid expansion of 3rd rail between the wars meant that there was a constant demand to increase the fleet of EMUs to run on it. The EE507 motor was introduced in the mid thirties and from then, units could be kept going almost indefinitely by replacing motor brushes, bearings and windings, resistor bank elements and switchgear. By the early days on BR, the practice was still in full swing, with bodies being replaced on original underframes and new designs (like EPBs, CEPs, CIGs etc.) pushed into service, still relying on virtually the same traction components. Eventually, it was the unacceptability of non-corridor compartments, MKI body crashworthiness and slam doors as passenger safety issues that saw their wholesale removal rather than the inability to support their traction equipment in service. In the years of rail passenger decline from the '60s onwards, there were many commentators that cited the general unattractiveness of this repeated life extending as part of the problem.
The MKIII interiors of the 769s are by comparison far less antiquated than those pre-war suburban EMU legacies were in the '60s.