Well they are 230s so I assume you mean same as the LNWR ones. I think they are slightly different but still have a mix of longitudinal and transverse seating.
TfW have contracted the maintenance to Stadler at Birkenhead North. Hopefully reliability is better than LNWR.
The 150s are already released from Bidston duties… As for covering 230 diagrams there might just be enough train crew available for one diagram or part thereof. Two diagrams no chance..
Ah yes I'd forgotten it was no service currently. Hopefully they can get these out to get the line back running again.
TfW's units are diesel electric hybrids, so the load on the engines isn't quite as high as LNR's units which draw power from the eninges alone. TfW's units can accelerate from a standstill with power just coming from the batteries and I assume ancillary things like the aircon with draw power from the batteries.
Is that in the singular or the plural tense?
1 unit on the diagram which stays out for full service duration. The plan is to roll them onto both all stops diagrams. They're still toying with 197s for the limited stop service.
Thank you for that. Presumably service will remain at 1tp2h with a 230 due to the unit shortages until a 2nd one can be introduced?
Anyone remember the very first days of the Vivarail Class 230 project being the subject of discussion on this website and the Shooter acolytes trumpeting the word "innovative" at the time.
I could nominate any number of post-privatisation diesel fleets currently suffering from poor reliability and resilience. In particular the CAF and CAF-maintained units are seeing more than their share of woes.
Have these a similar operational record comparative to the Vivarail units on the Marston Vale Line?
Not to the one who was most vociferous in his criticism of that project on this website from the start all those years ago and the one who was proved right.
With the best intentions - what has your repeated commentary produced? It has been stated several times that the Class 197s are not capable of providing the desired 2tph service. So the Class 230 hybrids have, in this application, been found to be a suitable medium term solution.
There has been much comment passed by the users of the Vivarail product concerning various aspects of travel experienced by the train travellers on the Marston Vale line. I make no comment about the CAF units as they are off-topic to this particular thread discussion.
Which I will admit is in part due to my involvement with early development of some of the battery technologies, however I rest my case that few other rolling stock suppliers have thus far appeared to have the capability to produce battery-equipped rolling stock for the British market.
When were these units, when in the process of transfer, said to be expected to be in revenue earning service?
I think it is unfortunate that the Borderlands units have the same class number as the Marston Vale class 230s. They are not really comparable as the Borderlands 230s have tracton batteries as well as an engine. After all South wales has 231 distinct from 756s.
What areas are they only suitable for? They were the only affordable solution on the IOW but any other unit would be fine on Borderlands or Marston Vale.
Siemens regularly delivers new Vectrons on time to customers (the first Danish locos were delivered early, for example) - but that's the benefit of production of a standard design over a long period of time (>10 years).
Peter Sarf said:
The issue on the Marston Vale is a bit chicken and egg, NR have only maintained the line\stations for 2x20m stock because that is what was being and in future would be operated. If WMR had chosen to use 170\172\196s on the MV the modest ivestment required in station extensions\signal resiting would have occurred. However with the future of the line up in the air due to East West Rail and pressure from 'above' to find a use for 230s they were chosen and the 150/153s could go off lease and NR weren't activated.
Monday we've all heard suggested on the local Facebook groups
Realtime trains has class 230 in use on the line tomorrow (as well as the replacement bus)...
Whilst I feel sorry for Marston Valley Customers , can we get back to the issue of the Borderland line. A promise of 2 trains per hour as part of the much hyped (but cut price) North Wales Metro has been nothing short of a disaster. Our hourly class 150 service has become zero trains per hour, replaced with a bus that take normally twice or ocasionally three times the time, making commuting impossible. They have had Class 230 since before the Class 197 arrived, with some of the latter now in service. Maybe the management of North Wales lines needs to be taken away from a South Wales based management who seem completely inept and priorities South Wales with fewer cancellations and in their words a good service on the Valleys lines to Cardiff. If only we had not been put into Wales and Border and stayed in a NW franchise, things might be better, and that means being part of Northern that says it all. Better still let Merseyrail and Stadler take over the 230s in the short term (Stadler will maintain them in Birkenhead North) and bring in Battery 777 to the line sooner rather than later. The latrer is what the local rail users association has advocated at a recent meeting.
I do wonder if it's an April fool's by rtt
Yes but it had no buses shown yesterday and a full service of trains, so I reckon that is a work of fiction. Looking to next week it indicated we would have a normal service using 230s, on real time trains. Now it is showing the frankly useless bus service. Don't forget tommorow is April 1st and we know what that means. TFW rail will probably be joking with their non South Wales based Customers by pretendibg 230s will run, but will probaably cancel, at short notice, with realtime trains not showing any train moving, as per the Monday after 11days of recent engineering in early March. They failed to communicate that change adequately. Sorry to be negative but sick of not having up to date info, no trains and South Wales based customers complaining that just one of their services home is cancellled, when TFW have just run trains on 1 day (a Sunday) in March 2023
Agree, but not by rtt by tfw
TFW are godawful at updating online systems. There are so many instances of rail replacement buses not showing up on systems or showing up with the wrong times. The worst TOC in the UK for it. It's just their team are careless and don't care about providing the correct information. Even when informed of errors, they choose not to correct the errors because it's clearly more effort than it's worth.
