London Paddington to Oxford - avoiding the dreaded Turbos

[eroded]

Hi,

I plan to travel to Oxford on Saturday, and would like to buy 1st class advance tickets in each direction.

However - I only wish to travel on HST/class 800 services. I most definitely want to avoid the dreaded evil Turbos!

Is there an easy way to find out which services these are online? Realtimetrains.co.uk shows "High Speed Train (HST125)" for seemingly all the services I looked at, but I'm not sure if it's to be believed?

Thanks,

 

[causton]

Not easily before the day (or even on the day!) as anything may happen.

I don't know what Advance prices you got but a Weekend First upgrade is £7.50 each way - so it would be £41 return if you bought an Off-Peak Day Return then got an upgrade both ways, so depends how that compares with Advance prices for complete flexibility.

 

[takno]

Hi,

I plan to travel to Oxford on Saturday, and would like to buy 1st class advance tickets in each direction.

However - I only wish to travel on HST/class 800 services. I most definitely want to avoid the dreaded evil Turbos!

Is there an easy way to find out which services these are online? Realtimetrains.co.uk shows "High Speed Train (HST125)" for seemingly all the services I looked at, but I'm not sure if it's to be believed?

Thanks,

There's a good chance that some (quite possibly most) of the HST-timed trains will actually be run by 800s. It's a lot less likely that any of them will be run by Turbos, since they would have trouble keeping to an HST schedule.

 

[cactustwirly]

Not easily before the day (or even on the day!) as anything may happen.

I don't know what Advance prices you got but a Weekend First upgrade is £7.50 each way - so it would be £41 return if you bought an Off-Peak Day Return then got an upgrade both ways, so depends how that compares with Advance prices for complete flexibility.

The timing loads are generally accurate, you can also use RTT to work out the origin depot, which will give you an idea whether it's a HST or IET.

 

[jimm]

Hi,

I plan to travel to Oxford on Saturday, and would like to buy 1st class advance tickets in each direction.

However - I only wish to travel on HST/class 800 services. I most definitely want to avoid the dreaded evil Turbos!

Is there an easy way to find out which services these are online? Realtimetrains.co.uk shows "High Speed Train (HST125)" for seemingly all the services I looked at, but I'm not sure if it's to be believed?

Thanks,

It would make it easier to offer advice if you said what sort of times you are thinking of travelling, but a basic rule of thumb is that any service now that continues past Oxford on to the Cotswold Line or comes off the Cotswold Line on a Saturday should be an IET or an HST (most are IETs, perhaps a couple of HSTs) unless something fails and a Turbo is used as a substitute.

IETs are now working most of the London-Oxford and back fast services on weekdays as well, but I don't know about the shape of Saturday services as I tend not to be going that way at weekends.

Not sure there's much more to say, as pretty much all of this can be found in the thread linked below anyway

https://www.railforums.co.uk/thread...rain-iep-initial-diagrams-allocations.153431/

 

[cactustwirly]

The 1201 & 1301 OXF - PAD are HST/IETs, but the 1000, 1101, 1401 & 1501 are turbos

 

[eroded]

Thanks for the replies, all - very useful.

I hadn't considered weekend first, so will do that to give flexibility.

I shall try to take one of the Cotswold Line services at 10:22 or 11:22 in that case.

 

[FGW_DID]

Thanks for the replies, all - very useful.

I hadn't considered weekend first, so will do that to give flexibility.

I shall try to take one of the Cotswold Line services at 10:22 or 11:22 in that case.

@eroded

Sat 6th
10.22 is booked for an 800 (9 car)*
11.22 is booked for an 800 (5 car)*

*usual disclaimer: dependant on unit availability / service requirements.

P.s what’s wrong with our lovely Turbos? (Don’t answer that!)

 

[NickBucks]

I was under the impression that the seats in the Turbos were better i.e. not ironing boards and after all you would be sitting in them for longer !

 

[jimm]

Can we keep the seats out of it? They are entirely a matter of personal preference and I can assure you that you don't want to hear what I think about Turbo seats after 20-odd years of using them.

 

[cactustwirly]

I was under the impression that the seats in the Turbos were better i.e. not ironing boards and after all you would be sitting in them for longer !

Yes but the turbos have a high density layout with 2+3 seats, and no tables (unless you're lucky and you get a 166)

 

[nickswift99]

Yes but the turbos have a high density layout with 2+3 seats, and no tables (unless you're lucky and you get a 166)

They do however have the same level of catering service available as most IET services.

 

[Wilts Wanderer]

From memory the 1520 Paddington-Great Malvern and 1834 Great Malvern-Paddington are diagrammed for a 3-car Turbo (in the long-term plan at least) so probably best to avoid those workings. Anything to/from Hereford, or timed HST is very unlikely to produce a Turbo unless something goes wrong on the day.