Why Can't First Get the Air-Con to Work on Their 158's?

[Bletchleyite]

Agreed,I would say on the 166's on the Reading/Gatwick service a/c is more often broken than working.

I have never been on a 166 with properly-working[1] aircon, ever. And I have been on many. I guess it stopped working when CFCs stopped being used.

[1] 21 +/- 2 degrees, according to fGW.

 

[455driver]

That would be time well spent - if the crews were able to fix failed air cons. I wonder what proportion of these failed air cons could be fixed by tech savvy crews? As someone remarked earlier, elderly people were getting 'distressed' on one train on a very hot day. What will it take to get something done about this - a death?

But what happens when one of those tech savvy train crews buggers the system up completely, which department pays to fix it?
It is all about culpability and blame!
'They' don't like us touching anything below the solebar or behind panels unless absolutely necessary!

Edit-
Down our end the units are left running while they are fuelled and prepped, they only get switched off when finally stabled because it takes ages to get the air pressure back up again. We don't get 158s down here very often though!

 

[scotraildriver]

Oh? Our sheds have big signs that engines must be shut down before fuelling. Interesting.

 

[Envoy]

I don't think this problem is confined to 158s, 166s also suffer from broken air-con.

Well that is indeed good news! The 166's (& 165's) are going to replace 158's on the Portsmouth to Cardiff route. What with failed Air Con & overcrowding, I bet a lot of people who have the car option will go by road rather than train. (Between Cardiff > Taunton FGW usually use the terrible 1501's (with 5 seats across & no Air Con fitted). I have even seen these units used on the Cardiff > Portsmouth service.

 

[Harlan Cage]

It appears that FGW pays scant regard to air-con for non express services.

There is no technical excuse for not sorting the air-con issues out, just look at what Adrian Shooter and Chiltern Railways achieved with a low cost and practical solution for their 165/0's

HC

 

[Bletchleyite]

It appears that FGW pays scant regard to air-con for non express services.

There is no technical excuse for not sorting the air-con issues out, just look at what Adrian Shooter and Chiltern Railways achieved with a low cost and practical solution for their 165/0's

There is a marked difference in attitude between fGW and Chiltern, of course.

Chiltern fix the problem. FGW lie about having fixed it, then state that they won't leave the windows unlocked because of people chucking stuff out. What's more important, sweltering passengers, or vandals that could instead chuck things out of 165s or HST droplights?

 

[FenMan]

It appears that FGW pays scant regard to air-con for non express services.

There is no technical excuse for not sorting the air-con issues out, just look at what Adrian Shooter and Chiltern Railways achieved with a low cost and practical solution for their 165/0's

HC

I beg to differ. As a regular use of North Downs services I've seen a distinct improvement. There are refurbed 166s around where the updated aircon works well in my experience.

 

[VP185]

The air con on the FGW 166 is being stripped out and replaced.... again.

Issues between contractors and leasing company I understand. The contractor stating there's nothing wrong with the A/C and that any problems were caused by open windows.

 

[Derbyshire Gra]

The detailed reply further up about the three different systems is factually correct, although a fourth system was trialled for a couple of years on one TransPennine unit (and was later replaced as ineffective). However, the criticism of the ROSCOs is unjust.

Porterbrook developed a plan to replace all their units with the revised (and more reliable) Liebherr systems, starting with the SWT 159 units and then planned to work through all of the 158s. However, on every occasion, they had to get the agreement of the TOC involved to undertake this work. Northern, Scotrail, Cross Country and the then Central all agreed fitment programmes (including the 158/9s which, were not part of the Porterbrook fleet, but the purchase and fitment was managed by them). It also co-incided with the DaFT playing God and moving units around the TOCs (and moving centre cars too) such that the programme for fitment became far more difficult - but all of Porterbrook's TOC customers proceeded with the change outs except Great Western, who flatly refused to allow Porterbrook to fit the replacement system to the ex TransPennine cars. This resulted in GW having some of all three systems, and a mix of systems in some three car units - a nightmare for maintenance. I don't believe Angel changed many of their fleet, except the former Central Trains units.

The Liebherr system is basically good - but it does require maintenance, including an annual maintenance overhaul and test - which some TOCs seem to disregard. All 158s run to the hydrostatic system limits, so there is very little spare to permit any larger air conditioning systems to be considered.

As an aside, I have lost count of the times I have got onto an East Midlands 158 showing all four air con systems functioning correctly and found the hoppers open. Trying to cool the whole of the Midlands rather than two carriages, inevitably pushes the systems beyond design parameters, leading to a self fulfilled failure.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Issues between contractors and leasing company I understand. The contractor stating there's nothing wrong with the A/C and that any problems were caused by open windows.

I can act as a witness that the problem is caused by the system not being fit for purpose, given that locking the windows just served to fry the passengers more. Good that they are being replaced again, hopefully it will work this time. In the meantime I seek out 165s instead...
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

As an aside, I have lost count of the times I have got onto an East Midlands 158 showing all four air con systems functioning correctly and found the hoppers open. Trying to cool the whole of the Midlands rather than two carriages, inevitably pushes the systems beyond design parameters, leading to a self fulfilled failure.

You would think it would be vaguely possible to implement a safety cut-out of some kind before it fried itself. FWIW my car aircon manages not to blow up if you forget to turn it off before opening the window on a hot day.

 

[broadgage]

Unfortunately waiting 15 minutes for the engine to shut down is often totally impractical. We have up ton 15 158s coming on depot each night and having to wait for each one to shut down before fuelling would cause a backlog onto the main line and waste almost 4 hours per night waiting. It is a stupid impractical system that no other train is saddled with.

Why not fuel the units with the engines running ? changing the rules if need be to permit of this. Diesel fuel is relatively low risk, nothing like petrol.
Another post on this thread suggests that at least one TOC does fuel the units with the engines running, presumably in safety.

 

[Mojo]

I have never been on a 166 with properly-working[1] aircon, ever. And I have been on many. I guess it stopped working when CFCs stopped being used.

[1] 21 +/- 2 degrees, according to fGW.

How on earth could you suggest that trains that only operate in the South East could possibly be below an acceptable standard?!

Everyone knows that London and the South East has brand new, top-of-the-range trains that are lovely and cool in the summer and nice and toasty in winter. Whereas everyone else, particularly the North, has to put up with always broken trains that are boiling hot all summer long :roll:

 

[SpacePhoenix]

Could they be plugged into an external power supply to power the air con system whilst it's shutting down to allow the engine to be shutdown whilst refuelling? How long does it typically take to refuel a 158 (assuming the tank being full to the brim afterwards)?

 

[LowLevel]

As an aside, I have lost count of the times I have got onto an East Midlands 158 showing all four air con systems functioning correctly and found the hoppers open. Trying to cool the whole of the Midlands rather than two carriages, inevitably pushes the systems beyond design parameters, leading to a self fulfilled failure.

The green ACU ok LEDs don't actually mean the system is working though - just that the units themselves are OK. Even if the thing is blowing out hot air constantly or needs regassing they generally show OK.

If it's not cooling effectively after 3 hours of the engine running it's not OK. Even if you are instructed to isolate the ACIS as it's busted the green lights twinkle away.

 

[Parallel]

The last two FGW 158s I have used have had liquid from the air conditioning leaking into the carriage near to the doors to the vestibule. What causes this to happen?

 

[Quickthorn]

Unfortunately waiting 15 minutes for the engine to shut down is often totally impractical. We have up ton 15 158s coming on depot each night and having to wait for each one to shut down before fuelling would cause a backlog onto the main line and waste almost 4 hours per night waiting. It is a stupid impractical system that no other train is saddled with.

With a short press of the stop button, they'll run on for a couple of minutes at most, not 15.

 

[LowLevel]

The last two FGW 158s I have used have had liquid from the air conditioning leaking into the carriage near to the doors to the vestibule. What causes this to happen?

If it's purple or similar it's a split coolant hose. If it's just water it's the condensation overflowing.

 

[broadgage]

Could they be plugged into an external power supply to power the air con system whilst it's shutting down to allow the engine to be shutdown whilst refuelling? How long does it typically take to refuel a 158 (assuming the tank being full to the brim afterwards)?

An external electrical supply would not help as the air conditioning compressors are driven hydraulically by the engines and not electrically.
In theory an electrically powered hydraulic pump could be added but that is adding considerable cost, weight, complication, and would need a redesign of the hydraulic system.

 

[Servotech Rail]

Because, under the terms of the lease they have no power to withhold lease payments and it will be an event of default if they do so.

The performance of rolling stock is very rarely covered in rolling stock leases. This was quite deliberate policy dating back to 1994 so as to keep the ROSCOs from pricing performance risk into the lease price.

In my dealings with Rosco's there are different lease agreements "Soggy" and "Wet" and depending on which agreement the TOC has signed up to it will have bearing on who pays for what.
As an example we are repairing the HVAC plc's for a manufacturer who in turn sell this repair service to the TOC and with the blessing of the Rosco.

 

[43096]

In my dealings with Rosco's there are different lease agreements "Soggy" and "Wet" and depending on which agreement the TOC has signed up to it will have bearing on who pays for what.

As an example we are repairing the HVAC plc's for a manufacturer who in turn sell this repair service to the TOC and with the blessing of the Rosco.

There are "dry" leases as well! It's largely to do with who is responsible for maintenance, ranging from ROSCO does everything (wet lease), through split responsibility (generally TOC does level 1-4 work, ROSCO does level 5 heavy overhauls - soggy lease) to TOC does all maintenance (dry lease).

 

[Blindtraveler]

I did some quite lengthy Northern 158 miles recently and 2 out of the 3 units had the air con going amazingly, in fact the 3rd one was colder than the much newer transpenine 350 I rode the following day

 

[47271]

Scotrail 158 aircon is a lot better than it used to be as well. It's a long time since I've had a bad one, and it used to be the norm that they were sweltering on warm days.

 

[Mordac]

Scotrail 158 aircon is a lot better than it used to be as well. It's a long time since I've had a bad one, and it used to be the norm that they were sweltering on warm days.

Funny you should mention that, because I was on one on Tuesday and the windows were open. Aircon wasn't working as far as I could tell. Fortunately was a short journey.

 

[Servotech Rail]

Scotrail 158 aircon is a lot better than it used to be as well. It's a long time since I've had a bad one, and it used to be the norm that they were sweltering on warm days.

I can't speak for the 158's but we are working on the 334's so once we have our test rig up and running things should be better on those Juniper trains.

 

[Deepgreen]

Agreed,I would say on the 166's on the Reading/Gatwick service a/c is more often broken than working.

Indeed - far more often! What annoys/amuses me (according to mood and temperature) is the notice on the hoppers stating that "In the unlikely event of air-conditioning failure...". My bold - if only!

 

[superkev]

IW in modern railways made a point that when coaches have opening vents there is less incentive for maintenance staff to fix the air con. He suggested that if the vents where removed things would probably improve.
A look round Leeds station on a hot day will reveal the majority of northens 158's have the vents open indicating a probable cooling fault.
I learnt a few years ago to avoid northern trains in hot weather.
K

 

[fgwrich]

Indeed - far more often! What annoys/amuses me (according to mood and temperature) is the notice on the hoppers stating that "In the unlikely event of air-conditioning failure...". My bold - if only!

Someone's got to be optimistic!

Just out of question, does anyone know why has the air con always been abysmal on the 166s?

SWTs Fleet doesn't seem to be enjoying the heat either at the moment, fair few 159s running around with the windows open this week. The 159 I had back on Saturday had the windows loosely closed on my coach as well, indicating a recent fault.

 

[Servotech Rail]

Someone's got to be optimistic!

Just out of question, does anyone know why has the air con always been abysmal on the 166s?

It could be that 166's don't actually have an HVAC system, it might something other than air con.

 

[Envoy]

It seems to me that the travelling public must be prepared for anything if they take a train journey. So, they could be frozen to death by air con being too cold (whilst wearing summer clothes) or they could be cooked to death in trains with either no air con working (or not fitted in the first place). Think I will stick to my car - guaranteed a seat and no need to book yonks ahead in order to get a decent price.

 

[Deepgreen]

Someone's got to be optimistic!

Just out of question, does anyone know why has the air con always been abysmal on the 166s?

SWTs Fleet doesn't seem to be enjoying the heat either at the moment, fair few 159s running around with the windows open this week. The 159 I had back on Saturday had the windows loosely closed on my coach as well, indicating a recent fault.

On Tuesday this week, I travelled on a Southern 377 from Victoria with a hopper open for the first time. I don't think the air-con had actually failed, so perhaps it was a precaution. Anyway, a surprisingly rare event. I also travelled yesterday on a Thameslink 387/1 where the air-con certainly had failed!