Northern Unit Refurbishments and depot allocations.

[Liam L]

There will be 3 transferring (hopefully) on the 11th December.

Is it just the 3 for the time being? Sorry for the late reply just catching up on this thread.

As a regular on the cross city, I don't want to see the sight of 3 car trains again before the 730s come to the route (which seemingly we will be the last to get them by the sounds of it)

 

[modernrail]

busy in the Sheff to York service!

Where is everyone, or is it always that empty?

Sounds like something between a guy being held at gun point told to ‘read this’, Alan Bennet becoming bored of reading one of his own plays and the Hale and Pace Yorkshire Airlines scene.

Glad it’s a priority for Northern now they have made everything else work really well.

 

[reecestrains]

Can anyone confirm if they've begun rolling out the new announcements on the Class 158's?
I saw online on the automated announcements site that they're now been implemented into the 158's.

 

[Harvey B]

Any word on when the 333's will start getting Train FX?

 

[diligentdave]

Any word on when the 333's will start getting Train FX?

Work is planned to begin last week of November.

 

[Blindtraveler]

Travel on these units will never be the same again without being welcomed aboard the Skipton train. I guess nothing lasts forever

 

[sprite]

Travel on these units will never be the same again without being welcomed aboard the Skipton train. I guess nothing lasts forever

Whilst boarding the train in Ilkley that is headed to Leeds.

 

[Harvey B]

Work is planned to begin last week of November.

Thanks so much.

Travel on these units will never be the same again without being welcomed aboard the Skipton train. I guess nothing lasts forever

It will be sad day indeed but i presume they'll be done one at a time so it'll be a good while before the unique 333 announcements go for good

 

[reecestrains]

It is sad, but the system is obsolete now and is from when the trains first came out back in 2001. So it's due for an upgrade.

I've been on the 333's recently and the screens and announcement have been rather glitchy, so it seems they're near end of life on that.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 10 Oct 2023 ==

Work is planned to begin last week of November.

If you don't mind me asking, where did you find this out?

Sorry, I replied to the wrong message first time I sent this.

 

[skyhigh]

If you don't mind me asking, where did you find this out?

They work for Northern.

 

[johntea]

The 170 Harrogate units seemingly need a female voice just to announce ‘This is the Northern service to…’ quickly followed by Mr Yorkshire completing the announcement!

‘Horsforth’ needs some improvement, currently being pronounced as if there is a question mark at the end!

‘The next station is…Horsforth?’

Also quite a few grammatical errors on the scrolling text :- (someone isn’t a fan of CAPITAL letters seemingly!)

‘be aware that smoking or vaping is not permitted’ (surely ‘are’ rather than ‘is’)

‘mind the gap between train and the platform edge’ (mind the missing ‘the’ too!)

‘penalty fare of 100’ (100 what…magic beans?! )

 

[D6130]

It will be sad day indeed but i presume they'll be done one at a time so it'll be a good while before the unique 333 announcements go for good

At least first time visitors to the area won't be panicked by the announcement 'This train terminates here' while it is standing at Cononley, Ben Rhydding, Shipley or Frizinghall!

 

[skyhigh]

At least first time visitors to the area won't be panicked by the announcement 'This train terminates here' while it is standing at Cononley, Ben Rhydding, Shipley or Frizinghall!

'Certain people' used to love playing with the old announcements. Allegedly if you pressed the buttons in the right order you could get it to announce "We are sorry that the next station is Keighley" by joining together bits of separate announcements...

The old PIS isn't fit for purpose (and hasn't been for years now) so it's good that it's finally getting updated - but a shame that certain functionality for crew will be lost that isn't supported by TFX.

 

[Harvey B]

At least first time visitors to the area won't be panicked by the announcement 'This train terminates here' while it is standing at Cononley, Ben Rhydding, Shipley or Frizinghall!

You forgot Guiseley and also Kirkstall Forge

 

[D6130]

You forgot Guiseley and also Kirkstall Forge

Yes, you're right, I forgot Guiseley....but Kirkstall Forge was still just a twinkle in some planner's eye when I retired!

 

[reecestrains]

I'd love to hear "Welcome to the Doncaster Train!" before they get changed. Just depends if they'll ever be a wrong announcement put up on the Airedale route or if by amazement a 333 goes down to Doncaster. But I know it's not long to go though!

 

[pokemonsuper9]

Just seen this video from Nick Badley which goes through the process of updating the announcements on a 150/1.

 

[darylyates17]

Headbolt Lane is now showing on the PIS and seems to have the new announcement saying Headbolt Lane the rest of it was still the old one.

 

[johntea]

Just seen this video from Nick Badley which goes through the process of updating the announcements on a 150/1.

Fascinating to see how it is actually quite a 'manual' process with SD cards, I thought they would just be sat in the office drinking coffee and updating them over a mobile data link

Still don't quite know why they've recently decided to do a remix with the female voice having the honours of saying 'This is the Northern service to' before Mr Yorkshire takes over all of a sudden though!

 

[JordR]

Fascinating to see how it is actually quite a 'manual' process with SD cards, I thought they would just be sat in the office drinking coffee and updating them over a mobile data link

Particularly as it does seem to have some form of mobile connectivity with an EE logo on the TrainFX box.

Is that kit brand new? With a monochrome display and cheap push buttons for entering the headcode and other detalis?

 

[skyhigh]

Is that kit brand new? With a monochrome display and cheap push buttons for entering the headcode and other detalis?

A few years old now but otherwise new.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 17 Oct 2023 ==

Particularly as it does seem to have some form of mobile connectivity with an EE logo on the TrainFX box.

There is a 4G connection that has previously been used to upload ad-hoc announcements to the system but obviously given the bigger update it was chosen to do it directly. It's also used to allow live service updates.

 

[theblackwatch]

Mr Yorkshire

I like that name! I was on a train from Leeds to Sheffield the other week and a couple of passengers alighting at Barnsley commented that the announcement "makes us sound like yokels". I thought to myself "you do!" . I think they thought that 'Mr Yorkshire' just announces the word Barnsley.

 

[Liverpool 507]

I hate the new announcements. Very unprofessional voice overs with irritating and abrupt voices, too many long pauses between words, and just cringe worthy as a whole.

 

[connorwilsonwy]

Penguin

 

[50002Superb]

Hi @diligentdave do you think either 5J81 or 5E12 will be running on Saturday and, if so, which units are they likely to be?

Many thanks
50002Superb

 

[Liam L]

For those interested, 323208 will be transferring from WMT to Northern on Saturday.

10:40 off Soho. https://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/service/gb-nr:K05507/2023-10-28/detailed

 

[simon7929]

I hate the new announcements. Very unprofessional voice overs with irritating and abrupt voices, too many long pauses between words, and just cringe worthy as a whole.

They are terrible I agree. They seem to bellow out at excessive volume also. I saw one passenger the other day with his hands over his ears. Ridiculously loud.

 

[diligentdave]

Hi @diligentdave do you think either 5J81 or 5E12 will be running on Saturday and, if so, which units are they likely to be?

Many thanks
50002Superb

Neither will run.

 

[50002Superb]

Neither will run.

Thanks for confirming @diligentdave

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

I hate the new announcements. Very unprofessional voice overs with irritating and abrupt voices, too many long pauses between words, and just cringe worthy as a whole.

I agree, but I do have somewhat of a bias