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Thameslink/ Class 700 Progress

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jon0844

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Look for new signs for the Class 717s. This time they'll just say '717'.
 

JonathanH

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700060 finally into service today.

Appears to have worked to Smithfield siding overnight and into service on the 0941 Blackfriars to Rainham (left 15 minutes late and terminated at Gillingham).

That is all 115 units having seen passenger service now although the peak requirement is somewhat less than that.
 

387star

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is wifi only on later units that have tables or do some tableless units have the wifi now?
Any diwn time in the fleet could be used to retrofit tables ,?
 

MML

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As they retrofit the seat back tables, I'd like them to also adjust the seats to provide 1 more inch of legroom for the most cramped airline seats, and move the seat 1 inch further away from the side walls to improve foot clearance from the ducting.
It might then become an acceptable interior.

I'm not sure whether it's just my devices, but the Wifi seems fairly slow. I regularly end up switching to 4G just to browse the internet.

Credit where credit is due, with all the hot weather of late, the air conditioning is super cool. I can only imagine how uncomfortable travel would have been had 319s still been in operation with open window hoppers. With the 700s, you arrive refreshed.
 

jon0844

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The Wi-Fi is speed capped and some services blocked (you can't use Google apps and most video streaming services) but it's usually quite good in my experience. I think it uses EE but may have Vodafone as a fallback, but nothing compares to having your own dedicated connection.
 

Cletus

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All of the 700’s have now gone from Dollands Moor (there was 1 left last Saturday).
 

skyhigh

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I think it's a little disappointing that there's still issues with the PIS on these trains so long after they've been introduced. On my travels today one unit played the 'See it, say it, sorted' message as if it was coming over a poor phone line - very garbled. It then repeated "If you see something..." and froze, with the screens going white and then black for the rest of the journey with no further announcements.

Otherwise they're pretty good trains, in my opinion.
 

jon0844

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There's a definite glitch when the image shows for the security message. Once the image is on the audio doesn't stutter anymore.

I don't know how each screen operates but it seems they receive data to display, and some go out of sync and even fail entirely. They can then come back to life, suggesting they reset automatically after a set interval.
 

AM9

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There's a definite glitch when the image shows for the security message. Once the image is on the audio doesn't stutter anymore.

I don't know how each screen operates but it seems they receive data to display, and some go out of sync and even fail entirely. They can then come back to life, suggesting they reset automatically after a set interval.
Doesn't part of the security message not get shown in the 1st class areas. When the original sequence was working, a security message was only shown in standard class whilst the 'passengers with standard class tickets may use this area' message was shown in 1st.
 

jon0844

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Doesn't part of the security message not get shown in the 1st class areas. When the original sequence was working, a security message was only shown in standard class whilst the 'passengers with standard class tickets may use this area' message was shown in 1st.

The see it, say it, sorted gets shown throughout the train. It's the CCTV message that gets replaced by the message saying standard class ticket holders can sit in the rear first class.
 

samuelmorris

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I think it's a little disappointing that there's still issues with the PIS on these trains so long after they've been introduced. On my travels today one unit played the 'See it, say it, sorted' message as if it was coming over a poor phone line - very garbled. It then repeated "If you see something..." and froze, with the screens going white and then black for the rest of the journey with no further announcements.

Otherwise they're pretty good trains, in my opinion.
I'm pretty sure that bug was only introduced when the see it, say it message was added.
 

skyhigh

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I'm pretty sure that bug was only introduced when the see it, say it message was added.
In which case I withdraw my complaint, as it's probably not the fault of the trains! I've been away for a while - the last time I was using them regularly there were quite a few issues so I'd just assumed they'd continued in one form or another.
 

samuelmorris

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Yeah as far as I know although there were lots of issues with the displays going blank and the TfL info was never right, u travelled on the 700s quite frequently in the early days and never recall there being any issues with the audio until that modification (and even then, only with that message).
 

700007

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Near a bunch of sheds that aren't 66s.
The TfL info is a lot more accurate now and tends to work 100% of the time for me now.

The See It, Say It, Sorted message I think is an individual issue because I have had a lot of units that say it fine and then a lot of units where it is buggered.
 

AM9

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The see it, say it, sorted gets shown throughout the train. It's the CCTV message that gets replaced by the message saying standard class ticket holders can sit in the rear first class.
Ah yes so it was. Thanks for the correction.
 

spark001uk

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Question for a man/woman at the pointy end. If the ac sockets trip out, who resets them? Can you do it from the cab? Or is it some obscure procedure that half a dozen Siemens engineers have to carry out in full overalls and hard hat?
 

colinbloom

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29 Aug 2017
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I was on the 1821 Letchworth to Brighton last night. As we pulled into Hitchin, the train did an emergency stop, leaving the rear two coaches short of the platform. The lights then dimmed and the air-con went off. Driver said there was a fault with the train. We sat there for 25 minutes before limping into the platform where the train was taken out of service.

Sitting there in the sun with no air-con I wondered what emergency ventilation these 700’s have. This could be a very dangerous situation if the train had been packed and we were stuck for an hour.

As the driver presumably tried various software and Hardware resets, the lights went out completely and never came back on again. How ridiculous having a train where the emergency lighting goes out. What a poor design.
 

387star

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Cambridge to Brighton was due to go twice hourly in December? Why didn't it start off that way like the Peterboroughs?

Bedford to Littlehampton should see December increase.. anyone know the additional peak services planned?
 

James James

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29 Jan 2018
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I was on the 1821 Letchworth to Brighton last night. As we pulled into Hitchin, the train did an emergency stop, leaving the rear two coaches short of the platform. The lights then dimmed and the air-con went off. Driver said there was a fault with the train. We sat there for 25 minutes before limping into the platform where the train was taken out of service.

Sitting there in the sun with no air-con I wondered what emergency ventilation these 700’s have. This could be a very dangerous situation if the train had been packed and we were stuck for an hour.

As the driver presumably tried various software and Hardware resets, the lights went out completely and never came back on again. How ridiculous having a train where the emergency lighting goes out. What a poor design.
On the 385 the solution is to add a mesh/sheet across the bottom half of the doors, followed by opening the doors, at least according to this seemingly knowledgeable poster. I imagine this approach is used on other units too:
https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/scotrail-class-385-discussion.126141/page-56#post-3392655
 

Fincra5

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Cambridge to Brighton was due to go twice hourly in December? Why didn't it start off that way like the Peterboroughs?

Bedford to Littlehampton should see December increase.. anyone know the additional peak services planned?

The huge lack of drivers trained for that route...
 

DaveN

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28 Feb 2009
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Bedford to Littlehampton should see December increase.. anyone know the additional peak services planned?

First it has been announced that the GTR timetable won't be changing in December. We don't know yet when the full May timetable will be running.

Despite what GTR have been saying though, the May timetable (and the current interim July one) are very similar to the originally announced full timetable with the phased services removed.
So the "missing" Littlehampton trains are the 06:22 Littlehampton to Bedford (08:12 at Blackfriars) and the 16:14 Bedford to Littlehampton (
17:19 at Blackfriars). Yes a whole 1 train each way. So assuming that they manage to run the full May timetable at least on weekdays in the Autumn, I would guess that they would get added in May 2019.
 
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