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XC HST's

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57315

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You can't blame Virgin, they wanted 6/7 coaches

At the time the Dft and Virgin ordered the voyager fleet, passenger numbers on XC were extremely low and the timetable which was not clockface and slow.

The Dft and virgin decided on 4 and 5 car trains because passengers were not travelling long distances, they were travelling 'intercity' eg Bristol -Birmingham and birmingham -Derby, and believed at the time of no growth the trains would surfice.

Come operation princess.... It all went out the window.
 
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sprinterguy

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You can't blame Virgin, they wanted 6/7 coaches

That's why I mentioned Virgin AND the DfT: It's the DfTs' fault for specifying 4 and 5 carriage trains, and Virgins' fault for selecting underfloor DMUs for Crosscountry, if not the actual train type.

I can't believe that there was no thought given to the likely growth in passenger numbers once the regular, clockface Operation Princess was introduced.
 

Lampshade

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That's why I mentioned Virgin AND the DfT: It's the DfTs' fault for specifying 4 and 5 carriage trains, and Virgins' fault for selecting underfloor DMUs for Crosscountry, if not the actual train type.

It's not really Virgin's fault for that either, the Voyagers were the only intercity trains that they could order at the time, well them or 180s and we know what happened with them.
 

Greenback

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At the time the Dft and Virgin ordered the voyager fleet, passenger numbers on XC were extremely low and the timetable which was not clockface and slow.

The Dft and virgin decided on 4 and 5 car trains because passengers were not travelling long distances, they were travelling 'intercity' eg Bristol -Birmingham and birmingham -Derby, and believed at the time of no growth the trains would surfice.

Come operation princess.... It all went out the window.

I wouldn't say passenger numbers were extremely. On the Southampton - Birmingham axis at least, passenger numbers had experienced a huge rise in the 1990's, and I was warned aboput overcrowding between Birmingham and Reading on a journey in 1994.

Getting on to a northbound train at Bristol Parkway in the early 1990's usually emant difficulty in finding a seat.

Similarly, a 1992 service on a HST down the East Coast from Newcastle was also very busy and I;m sure that services were pretty frequent from the North East to the South West even in those days!

The truth is that the effects of brand new trains and increased services were either ignored, or the forecast passenger numbers were hugely inaccurate.
 

MCR247

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That's why I mentioned Virgin AND the DfT: It's the DfTs' fault for specifying 4 and 5 carriage trains, and Virgins' fault for selecting underfloor DMUs for Crosscountry, if not the actual train type.

I can't believe that there was no thought given to the likely growth in passenger numbers once the regular, clockface Operation Princess was introduced.

Voyagers would be fine trains if it had been done properly, like the Meridians
 

57315

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You have to remember the class 220 was the first Bombardier UK spec long distance unit, they were dipping their toes in the water.
Thats why when the 222 fleet was built they were able to capitalise on the mistakes made when building the 220 and being able to actively see in service faults.
 

YorkshireBear

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i don't think the design of a voyager suits most of the routes they operate and the DFT AXC and bombardier must know this
 

MCR247

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The XC franchise is set that the voyager fleet must be used at all times with the HST fleet supplementing them.
They cant just change over or order new trains.

I know, thats what I was saying :)
 

ainsworth74

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Well we can dream of the day that XC has longer and more comfortable trains can't we? :(
 
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Thats absolute rubbish, seating commitments?
NO 4 will be in daily service from Dec 10 due to the Dft agreed extension of the NCL -RDG to SOU for the Cruise Liner Market every 2 hours. This means 4 voyagers will be displaced from the NE -SW route requiring HST's to fill the empty spaces.

XC agreed as part of there franchise seating commitments to a daily increase in seats of 35%.
Ill pass on your comment to the source who told me RE number of HST's in daily service, but keep in mind it aint what you say its how you say it.
 

tbtc

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Thanks so much Mr Branson and DfT for putting your heads together and giving the UK a four carriage train on an Intercity route :roll:

I've no problem with them building 4/5 car coaches - you have to remember the muddle of "Cross Country" routes before the Voyagers - however I do have a problem with them being built *without* the potential to easily add extra coaches.

I can see the attraction in using Multiple Units, but they mean it's a lot lot harder to get hold of additional coaches.

We need 100 extra coaches to insert into 180/ 220/ 221 sets, but the production line isn't there. If they'd been built as loco-hauled trains it'd be a lot simpler to do this
 

57315

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XC agreed as part of there franchise seating commitments to a daily increase in seats of 35%.
Ill pass on your comment to the source who told me RE number of HST's in daily service, but keep in mind it aint what you say its how you say it.

That 35% increase is the 16 extra seats per every voyager in the fleet.
The HST's will increase to 3 or 4 from december that can be confirmed.
 

MCR247

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We need 100 extra coaches to insert into 180/ 220/ 221 sets, but the production line isn't there. If they'd been built as loco-hauled trains it'd be a lot simpler to do this

Would it though? At the moment for voyagers, you'd have the problem with engines, but it would be quite possible to get around if you wanted to do it badly enough.
There will be better ways of doing it than this but never mind!


If you classed the 220s and 221s as the same units for now to make life easier:
Virgin have 18 5 car voyagers and 3 4 car voyagers. That is 102 coaches. That means 102 engines
XC have 35 4 car voyagers and 22 5 car voyagers. That is 250 coaches. That is 250 engines.

If you made 44 coaches to lengthen all XC 5 car sets to 7 car and 105 coaches to make the 4 car ones 7 car you'd have 149 new XC coaches without engines. 102 of those could then be fitted with the engines from Virgin, leaving 47 still engine less. 42 of these could be fitted with a new type of engine, leaving XC with 6 non-standard (or are they?) full 7 car sets.

Now this is where it gets a bit (more) complicated:
You now still have 5 coaches without engines. 2 for 5 car set. These coaches would all be fitted with the new type of engine. 3 for a 4 car set. These have no engine for the time being.

The 5 car set, would have two coaches added, to make it 7 car, and then the 5 original coaches have their original engines replaced with the new type.

The 4 car set would have 3 coaches added without engines, to make it 7 car. The three coaches would then have the original engines from the 5 car set above.

This would leave two original engines for spares :)

The virgin ones would all just have new type engines fitted :)

Totals: I think I've gone wrong here :oops:
CrossCountry 7 car voyagers with original engines (220 & 221s): 50
CrossCountry 7 car voyagers with new type engines: 7
 

tbtc

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Would it though? At the moment for voyagers, you'd have the problem with engines, but it would be quite possible to get around if you wanted to do it badly enough.
There will be better ways of doing it than this but never mind!


If you classed the 220s and 221s as the same units for now to make life easier:
Virgin have 18 5 car voyagers and 3 4 car voyagers. That is 102 coaches. That means 102 engines
XC have 35 4 car voyagers and 22 5 car voyagers. That is 250 coaches. That is 250 engines.

If you made 44 coaches to lengthen all XC 5 car sets to 7 car and 105 coaches to make the 4 car ones 7 car you'd have 149 new XC coaches without engines. 102 of those could then be fitted with the engines from Virgin, leaving 47 still engine less. 42 of these could be fitted with a new type of engine, leaving XC with 6 non-standard (or are they?) full 7 car sets.

Now this is where it gets a bit (more) complicated:
You now still have 5 coaches without engines. 2 for 5 car set. These coaches would all be fitted with the new type of engine. 3 for a 4 car set. These have no engine for the time being.

The 5 car set, would have two coaches added, to make it 7 car, and then the 5 original coaches have their original engines replaced with the new type.

The 4 car set would have 3 coaches added without engines, to make it 7 car. The three coaches would then have the original engines from the 5 car set above.

This would leave two original engines for spares :)

The virgin ones would all just have new type engines fitted :)

Totals: I think I've gone wrong here :oops:
CrossCountry 7 car voyagers with original engines (220 & 221s): 50
CrossCountry 7 car voyagers with new type engines: 7

That's the kind of thing we need to do (plus extend 185s to five coaches), it just sounds really complicated. If we had a BR controlling things from on high, we could do it and take the short term pain. Trouble is, we have DFT micromanaging some tiny details but not providing the overall control and decisive leadership we need
 

swt_passenger

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XC agreed as part of there franchise seating commitments to a daily increase in seats of 35%.
Ill pass on your comment to the source who told me RE number of HST's in daily service, but keep in mind it aint what you say its how you say it.

To be specific, AXC agreed to increase the number of seats by 35% only on the NE/SW axis, only in the peaks, and only on the busiest part of the route, say Leeds to Bristol.

That is nothing like the '35% increase everywhere' usually implied...
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Thats absolute rubbish, seating commitments?
NO 4 will be in daily service from Dec 10 due to the Dft agreed extension of the NCL -RDG to SOU for the Cruise Liner Market every 2 hours. This means 4 voyagers will be displaced from the NE -SW route requiring HST's to fill the empty spaces.

Not so. Extending alternate services from Reading to Southampton every 2 hours only requires one additional unit on the route. That may well affect the HST usage, but it certainly doesn't mean 4 Voyagers will be displaced from the NE/SW.
 

MCR247

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That's the kind of thing we need to do (plus extend 185s to five coaches), it just sounds really complicated. If we had a BR controlling things from on high, we could do it and take the short term pain. Trouble is, we have DFT micromanaging some tiny details but not providing the overall control and decisive leadership we need

It is quite complicated, and if the order was placed now the cars would probably be ready by 2013. For one weeked XC would have to run a severely reduced service*, as a lot of cars would have to be OOS. The VT could have their engines swapped the week before.

Like an hourly York - Bristol and hourly Manchester - Reading/Basingstoke
 

tbtc

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It is quite complicated, and if the order was placed now the cars would probably be ready by 2013. For one weeked XC would have to run a severely reduced service*, as a lot of cars would have to be OOS. The VT could have their engines swapped the week before.

Like an hourly York - Bristol and hourly Manchester - Reading/Basingstoke

I'd love to see it happen, and it'd pay for itself easily over a decade, but itsa lot of short term cost. No ROSCO will take that risk in the current market, no TOC has a long enough franchise to make it worth the initial disruption and the DFT seem more concerned with "small scale" things to give a masterplan
 

sprinterguy

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In tbtcs' post, I'd like to point out that Virgin have no 220s, unless they are hiring in units from Crosscountry.

I'd think that adding two carriages to each Voyager type would be a good way to do things; giving fleets of 6 carriage 220s and 7 carriage 221s. I'd also think that it would be fine to add a trailer carriage and a powered carriage to each train, given the amount of power that a Voyager has anway, and how little they reach their top speed of 125mph on Crossocountry routes.

Now, Virgin have 18 221s (221101-118) which is 90 carriages.
Crosscountry have 34 220s and 26 221s. That's 60 trains, and hence 60 original spec engines to fit to an extra carriage in each unit. So de-engine 12 Virgin Super Voyagers and fit their engines to the new Crosscountry carriages, and seeing as this is fairly hypothetical, order a few more Pendolinos for Virgin on The Birmingham-Scotland route, seeing as Pendolinos are still in production, and cascade the remaining six Virgin 221s to Crosscountry and fit them with an unpowered trailer to make them six carriage units.

You'd also have to wonder what bogies would be fitted to any new build Voyager carriages: Would there be two seperate types to cater for the two different Voyager types (tilting and non-tilting)?
 

MCR247

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In tbtcs' post, I'd like to point out that Virgin have no 220s, unless they are hiring in units from Crosscountry.

Do you mean my post? Did you not read the bit where I said class 220s and 221s as the same types of trains? Virgin have 142, 143 & 144, 4 car 221s ;)
 

sprinterguy

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Do you mean my post? Did you not read the bit where I said class 220s and 221s as the same types of trains? Virgin have 142, 143 & 144, 4 car 221s ;)

Oh, sorry yeah your post, and you're right, they do have 142, 143 and 144 now that I've checked, sorry :oops: I wouldn't count the four carriage 221s the same as the 220s though, due to the differences with the bogies.
 

MCR247

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Yes, but what I meant was it was easier to count etc if you had them as one class, just for that post
 

57315

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To be specific, AXC agreed to increase the number of seats by 35% only on the NE/SW axis, only in the peaks, and only on the busiest part of the route, say Leeds to Bristol.

That is nothing like the '35% increase everywhere' usually implied...
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---


Not so. Extending alternate services from Reading to Southampton every 2 hours only requires one additional unit on the route. That may well affect the HST usage, but it certainly doesn't mean 4 Voyagers will be displaced from the NE/SW.

That 35% is 'Apparently' the 16 extra seats fitted to every voyager in the fleet when they went for Mods at Bombardier, Derby.

The winter diagrams wont be out until late November/Early December at the latest but sources in XC are stating some of the SOU -NCL COULD be double sets.

Same again with Sources in XC state 3-4 HST sets will be in daily service to cover for the movement of voyagers to the extended services.

A Change in the HST diagrams is also mooted but nothing is definite on the grand scale of things.
 

387star

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Mentioning Voyagers I've just been up to Manchester and back. Going and back seat reservation system not working and dodgy air con

The train was packed going between Southampton and Banbury- surely this route could do with 8 coach HSTs? Many people struggled to get bags on the overhead racks and nothing seems to have changed post refurbishment. Furthermore how on earth are people meant to know the luggage area (ex shop) exists? Is this area designed for one coach or the whole train? It was advertised on the way back but one woman refused to put her luggage there, so far from her seat!

Voyagers leave me with a headache. They have this annoying engine noise and sound and threadbare seats they really are a disgrace. Okay for light journeys but not on the long distance services!
 

swt_passenger

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That 35% is 'Apparently' the 16 extra seats fitted to every voyager in the fleet when they went for Mods at Bombardier, Derby.

That's definitely part of the extra seating calculation, but only a very small fraction. Indeed isn't 16 only applicable to 5 cars, and the 4 car units had less, 14 maybe? So as an overall percentage the extra seats are a single figure, about 7.5%...

The 35% extra through the West Midlands in the peaks is mainly the HSTs and a few double units here and there as far as I can see.

There's a DfT clarification here that shows how the percentage increases apply at different parts of the routes in the pm peak - but they give the general idea...

XC Capacity ITT Clarification

Hadn't heard any Southampton services would be doubled up, and agree that would definitely need more units on the route.
 
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