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There are clauses in every TOCs NRC that effectively states that the DfT has the power to dictate what a TOC can and cannot say about anything. They are now particularly paranoid about rolling stock deployment, particularly sensitive about newer stock standing spare and every “new” deployment...

The traction curve is set electronically on all Hitachi 8xx units. They are governed to meet a theoretical end to end timing so as to reduce engine wear. Therefore the amount of hp you have under the floor may not directly affect the acceleration rate. The curve on the GWR units was the subject...

Northern may well have had no plans and the railway journalists may have got their information from the TOC itself but they are asking the wrong people. Increasingly, it is the DfT who are calling the shots over which surplus rolling stock goes where. They will want newer rolling stock placed.

The Deltics were the last diesels to use troughs, the last in use being Wiske Moor. The Deltics were built with scoops in mind so their boiler water capacity was relatively limited. It wasn’t anything to do with the Spanner 2 vs Spanner 3 situation although the Spanner 3 was undoubtably a better...

I don’t think that separate legal entities are the current plan. It’s Region/Route management structures under one GBR legal entity. Anglia isn’t currently a NR Region - it is a Route within NR Eastern Region. The 2027 date is key because that is when GBR will come into being so any staff or...

Hitachi or the DfT via GWR.

The current problem is that even negotiating ANY change to pay and conditions at a DfT TOC has to be approved by the DfT and the resultant agreement also has to be approved by the DfT. Which is why I am surprised that XC are taking this action. If they haven’t had DfT approval, they would seem...

Why is shore supply so expensive? The amount of power you need at a location is considerable so you usually have a separate sub to provide it, together with all the appropriate switchgear. Then you have to run those cables underground to the individual control panels at the end of each road. And...

The push in East Anglia for the Ipswich-Cambridge/Ely routes is to get Ipswich to Peterborough hourly and to solve the Cambridge-Newmarket half hourly issue. Quite apart from the cost, Haughley North Junction doesn’t seem to add very much and the journey time savings seem to be negligible...

That is the real reason. They were always 0xx, 1xx and 2xx to both management and staff.

Shore supply of any description is hideously expensive to put in (it always has been, even in BR days) and, in any case, useless for 15x and 16x stock as they are not bus wired to support shore supply. Each power car is effectively its own system. What you usually do is connect each car up to...

They are usually on different profiles - the outer are both P1 and the middle one should be P9. The biggest cause of shifted cranks on BR was over speeding. You also had to keep the rods set up correctly, without letting them have too much play.

Getting out my old (1990’s) copy of MT 288, the diameter new for a 08 (and 09) was 1372mm, limit for scrap was 1287mm. Tyre thickness was 76mm new and limit for scrap was 33.5mm. That would give you a lot of scope for the rods of those two locos moving in and out of sync.

No, Lumo won’t be using them. Their paths only work with 80x traction and then there is the cost of fitting ATP to the units. They are also a pretty dire offer inside for any new OA business.

Some units have got to the stage where they can’t safely be run. The supply chain has also been severely disrupted because of this issue so there is a real shortage for 158/9 operators.

Lumo diversionary services on the ECML is restricted to electric lines only, unlike Hull Trains which has very wide diversionary knowledge. Lumo on the WCML will tend towards the Hull Trains diversionary model but they need time to get staff trained up. First priority will be the normal routes...

You usually monitor these kind of problems by regular oil sampling and analysis. No need to ground a unit until it is in danger of catastrophic failure.

The Hull Trains units were still on lease to Hull. They were being individually released from that lease early, when their replacements (the 180’s) had arrived, enough staff had been trained on them and the units themselves were fit to be put into passenger traffic. Iirc, the expectation at EMT...

The 222 units are a better train and they wanted 6 car trains. The tilt capacity wasn’t a factor for Lumo.

The problem with the 80x units is material degradation in the 7000 series aluminium in the transverse bolster fitted to the underneath of the body. The bogies themselves are fine. 7000 series aluminium behaves in odd ways in certain environmental conditions (we have known about this for several...