Air Con trouble

[theageofthetra]

Until train operators are penalized financially for turning out defective trains I can't see things improving.
It's all down to good basic maintenance like keeping condenser grids free of track dirt, fans operate and checking for leaks etc.
K

Could not agree more.

 

[theageofthetra]

I travel at lot on Southeastern's 375s too, but haven't personally noticed tremendous amounts of AC failures. I'd say around 30% of the services i've caught have had an AC issue in one carriage or unit, but i've not been on a service yet where not a single carriage has working AC.

I do find that the temperature can be noticeably different at different ends of the carriage, but that's presumably down to where the AC is fitted.

I'd prefer it if the AC was working without flaw on all of the Southeastern AC-fitted units, but I understand there's still quite a maintenance backlog that they're trying to get through across the whole fleet, and they're prioritising issues that prevent the units from being in service at all over things that improve passenger comfort.

I don't know why they require much maintenance since the units have just gone through a complete refurbishment. I do wonder if they are failing through a combination of the new darker livery and hopper windows being left unlocked & then opened by those who can't grasp the concept that your fridge doesn't work if the door is left open!

 

[alangla]

Makes sense, I guess that means I've got no way of knowing if the unit I was on had air con or not.

There's a big blue sign on the coving panel above the window saying something like "air conditioned carriage - keep window locked" if it's got air con. The ceiling panel is slightly different (larger, coarser holes) and you can see various coloured lights on the air con unit vs the single orange? One on a unit not fitted.

 

[Dougal2345]

Indeed. Travelled today on 4 different 444's on SWR. Air-con excellent on all of them.

Sadly 444s are not perfect - had a failed one on my evening commute home last week, a very unpleasant 25 minutes, and the free bottles of water didn't really help. Then on Sunday, another failure, this time luckily it was a 10-coach train and the guard was advising everyone to join the front 5.

 

[boxy321]

The 172s have been suffering too. The heat outside (from engines etc.) as one pulled up at Solihull last week was unbelievable. If the A/C fails on them I don't know what would happen.

The Kenilworth Thunderbolt 153 had all it's windows open a week or so ago and that was quite pleasant.

 

[nat67]

I think the worst thing the worst complaint on twitter about a GWR train without AC not working is a few days on the 19:03 London to Plymouth / Penzance service. Coach A was reported as being unbearable, the lights went out and the sockets weren't working.

Yes I have noticed that a lot this weekend as I was doing a Devon HST weekend and half the sets I was on they air con only worked in about 2 or three of the coaches and free water was being given. The good old Pembrokeshire spring still water. I was travelling back yesterday on the 1610 HST back to Didcot from Exeter via Weston and coach B was stifling hot. And with the lights its not exactly my job but I was on a XC HST and it had come off Laira and some of coach lights weren't not on so I pressed the car light button in the vestibule and they came on. But GWR are getting worse all the time.

 

[broadgage]

Half lighting might have been selected to reduce heat production, every little helps, in which case turning them on would make it still hotter.

On GWR HSTs it was a policy only to have half the lights on due to complaints about excessive lighting levels, might be similar on cross country ?

 

[43096]

Half lighting might have been selected to reduce heat production, every little helps, in which case turning them on would make it still hotter.

On GWR HSTs it was a policy only to have half the lights on due to complaints about excessive lighting levels, might be similar on cross country ?

No. I think he’s referring to no lights at all, so he turned them on using the car lights on/off buttons on the control panel.

Full/half lights used to be via a rotary switch near the vestibule door. FGW/GWR run with lights on half as they made a mess of the spec at refurb.

 

[FOH]

A 377/6 blasted through Forest Hill this evening with part of the front connecting door open. I wonder if that’s to provide relief to the driver for an cab air con failure

 

[tsr]

A 377/6 blasted through Forest Hill this evening with part of the front connecting door open. I wonder if that’s to provide relief to the driver for an cab air con failure

Most definitely not, and should be closed - but there would be a draught!

 

[apinnard]

Must be a bit of a pain from a maintenance perspective with the various different refrigerant gases being required. Does the really old air conditioned stock still use R12 or were they converted to R134a?

To make matters more confusing, is there any stock that uses R1234yf yet?

 

[AM9]

Must be a bit of a pain from a maintenance perspective with the various different refrigerant gases being required. Does the really old air conditioned stock still use R12 or were they converted to R134a? ...

Given that R12 was banned in 1994, I doubt that there would be any mobile installations still running around with it in their systems. I think that the only vehicles that were designed for R12 that are still in service would be the MKIII coaches (LHCS, HST and Class 442). If they are having problems with R134, that would reinforce the arguments for scrapping them.
There are newer refrigerants that are being considered for transportation, e.g. R744 (CO2) which is less of a climate change threat than R134 and quite safe if it leaks. We may get to the point where a/c is only deployed where it is essential (rather than 'nice to have').

 

[TwistedMentat]

The handful of times I've been on an 800 recently have been fine. Even with the train at the point of standing room only and the vestibules crushed I felt perfectly fine.