Caledonian Sleeper

[Caleb2010]

Network Rail must have indicated to Caledonian Sleeper that the line would be open, otherwise they would have cancelled the Fort William portion, wouldn’t they!

 

[PaxVobiscum]

Anyone know what’s happening with the last night’s southbound lowland sleeper stock? According to RTT it got stuck at Carlisle “This service was cancelled between Carlisle and London Euston due to a problem with the doors“. I can’t remember what the rotation of the units is and which northbound service the dodgy door train is due to do next (highland or lowland?). It must have been serious to cancel the service rather than fix it and run late.
I’m booked GLC-EUS tomorrow and getting a teeny bit concerned.

 

[InvHst]

Operationally the sleepers are complex. Typically the Highlander employs 5 diesel locos:

• 66+73/9 for Fort William
• 66+73/9 for Inverness
• 73/9 for Aberdeen

There are seasonal variations: The Fort William can run with just a single 73/9 when the load is short and the railhead conditions favourable. Sometimes the Inverness is 2x73/9 rather than shed+ED.

These diesel locos operates the evening up service followed by the morning up service.

Meanwhile 2 class 92s are also required for the Highlander: One up and one down. Plus one to draw the ECS between Euston and Wembley, however the Lowlander loco is used.


And then there is the Lowlander operation, which requires 5 92s:

1. ECS between Euston and Wembley
2. Down Euston - Glasgow
3. Up Glasgow - Euston
4. ECS between Glasgow and Polmadie - This can be the Highlander loco
5. Edinburgh portion (Polmadie - Edinburgh - Carstairs - Edinburgh - Polmadie)

Therefore I believe the typical minimum for 1 night is 6x92, 3x73 and 2x66 = 11

Inverness portion now will 99% of the time use 66/73 it won't use the 2 73s due to it basically knackering the 73s too quickly

 

[Peter Mugridge]

Anyone know what’s happening with the last night’s southbound lowland sleeper stock? According to RTT it got stuck at Carlisle “This service was cancelled between Carlisle and London Euston due to a problem with the doors“. I can’t remember what the rotation of the units is and which northbound service the dodgy door train is due to do next (highland or lowland?). It must have been serious to cancel the service rather than fix it and run late.
I’m booked GLC-EUS tomorrow and getting a teeny bit concerned.

It should be the northbound Highlander tonight - they might also run the failed set ecs to Wembley and get it fixed for tonight anyway.


Edited - in fact, that's exactly what they've done:

Realtime Trains | 5M11 0550 Carlisle to London Euston | 27/01/2025

Real-time train running information for 5M11 0550 departure from Carlisle to London Euston on 27/01/2025. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

 

[PaxVobiscum]

Many thanks - that’s reassuring.
Doesn’t mean that the set I’m on won’t act up tomorrow night of course. Just like the roulette that was the Mk 2/3 sleeper in its last years.

 

[tumbledown]

Anyone know what’s happening with the last night’s southbound lowland sleeper stock? According to RTT it got stuck at Carlisle

I was looking at Traksy at the time, it was showing a track possession on the Up Main south of Carlisle which hadn't cleared by 3 a.m.

 

[RGM654]

Anyone know what’s happening with the last night’s southbound lowland sleeper stock? According to RTT it got stuck at Carlisle “This service was cancelled between Carlisle and London Euston due to a problem with the doors“. I can’t remember what the rotation of the units is and which northbound service the dodgy door train is due to do next (highland or lowland?). It must have been serious to cancel the service rather than fix it and run late.
I’m booked GLC-EUS tomorrow and getting a teeny bit concerned.

What happened to the passengers? Tipped out in the middle of the night?

 

[alholmes]

What happened to the passengers? Tipped out in the middle of the night?

Presumably allowed to stay onboard until the first Avanti service of the day, which departed to London just ahead of the sleeper ECS.

 

[Peter Sarf]

Presumably allowed to stay onboard until the first Avanti service of the day, which departed to London just ahead of the sleeper ECS.

Given the sleeper actually moved onward from Carlisle at 05:58 I would have preferred to stay asleep onboard and take a late arrival in Euston on the chin. Granted it appears to have skipped Euston and gone straight to Wembley as it passed. How much earlier than a possible 12:20 would the next available Avanti service have got in ?

 

[Twingo37175]

Given the sleeper actually moved onward from Carlisle at 05:58 I would have preferred to stay asleep onboard and take a late arrival in Euston on the chin. Granted it appears to have skipped Euston and gone straight to Wembley as it passed. How much earlier than a possible 12:20 would the next available Avanti service have got in ?

Looks like this is what the passengers would have been on, into London for just after 9.

Realtime Trains | 1R22 0428 Glasgow Central to London Euston | 27/01/2025

Real-time train running information for 1R22 0428 departure from Glasgow Central to London Euston on 27/01/2025. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

 

[Peter Sarf]

Looks like this is what the passengers would have been on, into London for just after 9.

Realtime Trains | 1R22 0428 Glasgow Central to London Euston | 27/01/2025

Real-time train running information for 1R22 0428 departure from Glasgow Central to London Euston on 27/01/2025. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

Hmm, three hours earlier BUT a bad nights sleep.
Given the choice I would have gone for the sleep personally.
Depends if there is an important deadline in London for someone.

 

[Deepgreen]

Presumably allowed to stay onboard until the first Avanti service of the day, which departed to London just ahead of the sleeper ECS.

"Sorry Sir/Madam - for health and safety reasons you are not permitted to remain on a train with a defect"...

 

[43066]

"Sorry Sir/Madam - for health and safety reasons you are not permitted to remain on a train with a defect"...

Are you saying that’s what happened? It’s surely more likely that they were allowed to remain on board.

Hmm, three hours earlier BUT a bad nights sleep.
Given the choice I would have gone for the sleep personally.
Depends if there is an important deadline in London for someone.

It seems the best solution in the event of a defect that prevented the train continuing in passenger service.

 

[Deepgreen]

Are you saying that’s what happened? It’s surely more likely that they were allowed to remain on board.



It seems the best solution in the event of a defect that prevented the train continuing in passenger service.

No - I was joking, but it wouldn't surprise me in the least these days.

 

[43066]

No - I was joking, but it wouldn't surprise me in the least these days.

Fair enough - it’s difficult to tell sometimes!

 

[Caleb2010]

If you weren’t allowed to remain on a train that had a defect there wouldn’t be many journeys operated - Sleeper or otherwise!

 

[43066]

If you weren’t allowed to remain on a train that had a defect there wouldn’t be many journeys operated - Sleeper or otherwise!

That’s true as a general point, but not all defects are equal. There’s a reasonably long list of issues which would prohibit the train continuing in passenger service.

 

[dk1]

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 23 Jan 2025 ==


£19 at one point as well.

Beat me to it. That was even cheaper than the ‘priv’ berth fare which was a whopping £27 at the time.

 

[Scotrail84]

It should be the northbound Highlander tonight - they might also run the failed set ecs to Wembley and get it fixed for tonight anyway.


Edited - in fact, that's exactly what they've done:

Realtime Trains | 5M11 0550 Carlisle to London Euston | 27/01/2025

Real-time train running information for 5M11 0550 departure from Carlisle to London Euston on 27/01/2025. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

Wembley is not a maintenance depot now, basically just a stabling point where it gets CET'd, tanked and the beds get made.

 

[Class15]

Wembley is not a maintenance depot now, basically just a stabling point where it gets CET'd, tanked and the beds get made.

When it went to Willesden rather than Wembley, was that a maintenance depot? I assume the switch of depots was due to LO needing more space at Willesden?

 

[Scotrail84]

When it went to Willesden rather than Wembley was that a maintenance depot? I assume the switch of depots was due to LO needing more space at Willesden?

There are no CAF engineers at Wembley, when it was the old MK2/3 stock Alstom did a bit of work on them at Willesden/Wembley, but the main repairs were carried out in Inverness before Alstom took over at Polmadie.

If anything major goes wrong with a set now they generally need to get back to Polmadie before repairs can be made as Wembley was downgraded to a stabling point. I can only assume this was done for cost-cutting, but that's just me speculating. Not only that, it means 'faulty' sets can enter service from there as it's not classed as a maintenance depot.

 

[Peter0124]

It should be the northbound Highlander tonight - they might also run the failed set ecs to Wembley and get it fixed for tonight anyway.


Edited - in fact, that's exactly what they've done:

Realtime Trains | 5M11 0550 Carlisle to London Euston | 27/01/2025

Real-time train running information for 5M11 0550 departure from Carlisle to London Euston on 27/01/2025. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

So does all the stock on this mornings 5M11 work tonights down highlander do you know? I thought the highlander had a different configuration due to being split three ways, or are all CS coaches interchangable between the two services?

 

[Scotrail84]

So does all the stock on this mornings 5M11 work tonights down highlander do you know? I thought the highlander had a different configuration due to being split three ways, or are all CS coaches interchangable between the two services?

It does tonight but doesn't swap again until Friday evening so I was told. This was done to ensure a full rake of 16 was always on the Highlander at weekends but thats immaterial now that they've lost so many coaches to cracking and essential maintenance.

 

[mathstrains19]

So does all the stock on this mornings 5M11 work tonights down highlander do you know? I thought the highlander had a different configuration due to being split three ways, or are all CS coaches interchangable between the two services?

Glasgow portion typically has 2 accessible coaches, which effectively makes it the 2 portions that go to Fort William/Aberdeen on the highlander

 

[Scotrail84]

1S25 is still in Euston...

Reason unknown at present.

 

[43066]

1S25 is still in Euston...

Reason unknown at present.

On the move now.

 

[DavidCooper]

Text from CS said they needed another locomotive.

 

[Scotrail84]

On the move now.

That will struggle to make up 50 minutes, maybe 30 but probably not much more.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 27 Jan 2025 ==

Text from CS said they needed another locomotive.

At times it really is a shambles, very poor resilience for loco failures because they've not got enough 92s or 73s to allow for failures, severe shortage of coaches, lack of flexibility when using all available vehicles in an already depleted fleet to run a service.

 

[BRX]

The fact that they seem to have found another loco within an hour suggests that they do have enough 92s to deal with failures.

RTT showing it with 014 and 028 both on the front.

Realtime Trains | 1S25 2115 London Euston to Inverness and Fort William | 27/01/2025

Real-time train running information for 1S25 2115 departure from London Euston to Inverness and Fort William on 27/01/2025. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

 

[Scotrail84]

The fact that they seem to have found another loco within an hour suggests that they do have enough 92s to deal with failures.

RTT showing it with 014 and 028 both on the front.

Realtime Trains | 1S25 2115 London Euston to Inverness and Fort William | 27/01/2025

Real-time train running information for 1S25 2115 departure from London Euston to Inverness and Fort William on 27/01/2025. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

Thats unlikely to be accurate, I think one of them is a failure or is the draw back loco.