No. They can't maintain XC timetables and would require a considerable staff training programme.
It seems somewhat implausible that the fortunes of a fleet of 66 coaches will distort the rolling stock market to such an extent that it comes back to cost the railway significantly. The costs of staff training, changes to maintenance arrangements and other facts have to be taken into account as well when making the decision to enter into a new lease.
Indeed, but this void is for Beacon Rail, not the other leasing companies. The idea of a competitive market is that people who want to lease rolling stock can go to a number of different players in the market to finance new rolling stock. As I note above, they can only price in so much of their loss before they become uncompetitive.
Indeed and if I was a leasing company and wanted some extra trains to potentially lease I would be investing in a certain product from Hitachi. They would be B-Mode MUs that are endorsed by the DfT and used n large quantities by a number of operators - GWR, LNER, some independents, soon Avanti WCML and soon the MML. Call them Class 80Xs.
I know how about heritage railtours using the soon to be redundant DRS 20 & 37s and these Mk5s ?. Answer = Mk1s and early Mk2s.
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I wonder if the price to hire the 68s is quite high because, as you say, DRS have uses for them at DRS ?. The Mk5s can be as cheap as chips but useless without Locos.
Why does there need to be? TfW have bought their Mark 4s. The 67s would need adapting to work with Mark 5a carriages and TfW would be 'paying twice'.
Working with Tri-mode locos would be my guess if it ever happens.
No need - the 221s coming off lease from Avanti would already be enough for Grand Central to run almost every service with double sets if it wanted to, without needing to do anything with XC's fleet.
The leasing companies are interested in risk. They don't care about the railway - they do care about protecting their investment. So if they see nearly-new stock being handed back with no future leases they change their risk profiles and that feeds into the lease costs. What's more, short-ish leases for brand new stock will be out - they'll be looking for Section 54 agreements to protect their investment. Otherwise, the risk loaded into the initial lease would mean a much more expensive contract. Either way, it costs more.
They don't meet emissions regulations fir new locos iirc. Otherwise DRS would have probably got a few more.
Would the 68s be able to take over all the workings of the DRS heritage fleet? I believe they are RA7, versus RA5 for the "go anywhere" 37s.
Yes, very much so. However, I don't think any of that can be alleviated by taking the Mark 5a carriages back on lease as some sort of panic measure. It seems apparent that the reduction in rolling stock demand and increase in risk has now happened regardless of the fortunes of the Mark 5a coaches, because they are just another example of non standard rolling stock being set aside.
But it protects the leasing company’s investment, in this case Angel. We know that cost was a significant issue with ScotRail - new I7C stock was basically unaffordable - and the s54 agreement meant a lower annual lease rental as the contract was less risky for Angel. Can’t have it both ways.
What do RA5 and RA7 mean? I'd assume they're specific restrictions on where a loco can go but what is the reason a 68 would be RA7 and what would those restrictions be?
Primarily - weight.
It wouldn't be permitted to run over a route with a lower RA (Route Availabilty) number. Route Availability of locomotives and rolling stock is determined primarily by the axle loading of the vehicle concerned (i.e. its weight divided by the number of axles), but other factors can also come into play as well, such as width, length and distance between bogie centres. Route Availability of a particular line is primarily determined by the strength of undertrack structures such as bridges and viaducts, but also, to a lesser extent, by things such as curvature and platform clearances.
Thank you
Weights on the locomotive axles as I understand. This leads to restrictions on where the loco (and stock) can go, and at what speed it can progress.
For example on the Fenland lines around East Anglia there are large speed differences between Sprinters / Sprinter equivalents (755,s 170s etc) and everything else. Sprinters are allowed to do 75, whereas for locos etc it is around 45 mph? @dk1 being a local on those lines would know better than me.
Naturally you're not keeping to time if you can't keep to the required speeds.
As regards a "desperate TOC" - can't see it without motive power, and it's rather unlikely DFT are going to let a TOC fund a fleet of locos to run the Mk5 sets around to say the least! So much for LHCS being an improvement.
But by that time you will have the class 93 loco's, which I believe can also work with the the MK5a coaches? Do we know as yet what tasks the class 93 is going to be rostered to do?
