GWR want the 158s because of existing compatibility reasons, so Northern won’t be getting any more 15x and some of those 150s might not make it to 2025, let alone longer.
It is common knowledge that Northern’s 15x replacement (and 769 too) is being looked at with new build.
Really? I thought I read somewhere that the handful of Adelantes with EMR were performing fairly well, and I can't recall anything about Grand Central wanting rid of theirs.
Again, really? The 175s are still about 10 years newer than the 158s - is the corrosion that bad that the 175s will really be life expired before 158s (admittedly the latter are aluminium-bodied I think, which might give them a longer life than steel-bodied vehicles)?
I disagree - as long as you refurbish the seats (the padding has gone in some I think) class 175s would be a perfect fit for the Cardiff-Nottingham service if you ask me - a big improvement on 170s. I would say the same for Birmingham-Stansted but unfortunately that route needs stock which is permitted to run at Sprinter-differential speeds which rules out the 175s.
Cross Country has 22 x 3 car 170s and 7 x 2 car 170s. The are only 16 x 3 car 175s and 11 x 2 car 175s so there would be a decrease in capacity.
They aren't doing particularly well and aren't in that good condition.
The 170s also have to cover the Birmingham-Leicester/Nottingham stopping services though, which I wouldn't suggest using 175s on.
Although hearsay but I’ve been told that EMR are on the verge of shortening another unit to 4 car because of various issues. Grand Central have also a set full of “bad” coaches which can’t be used. 180103 I believe. I seriously believe at least the first of the Adelante range will be scrapped before the first 158s at least
Similar point to above but the easier option would be to just keep hold of the 170s until they’re ready for the scrapper. As mentioned above I don’t think there are enough 175s to replace the full crosscountry 170 fleet (although haven’t counted myself)
The 180s are basket cases more so than the 175s, full of rot and the systems are n better, there a threads about them on here, EMR have even looked at taking on some ex AWC 221s instead.
The stoppers interwork with the fasts so unless you’re looking at re-writing New Street and by default the rest of the country plus all the associated crew/fitter training just to get your favourite units on the fasts it’s a very bad idea.
The 175s are not necessarily my favourite units, but if you look back a few pages you'll see that I suggested having them sit around for an hour at Nottingham between runs or (flat crossing permitting) extending the Cardiff service to Lincoln. That wouldn't require rewriting New Street.
Maybe I was just having a bad day, but I made a fairly short trip once (think it was Newport or Severn Tunnel Junction to Gloucester, or vice-versa) on an XC 170 and was very glad to get off the damn thing. The legroom was absolutely dire - if anything it seemed even worse than a 150/153/Pacer (which are also dire). Strangely other 170s don't seem quite as bad (or maybe I just managed to grab a table bay all the other times?) so do XC have some with an extra row or two squeesed in? I know they have one fewer toilet on XC 170s compared to 175s or the TfW 170s. As for the doors, Voyagers also operate out of Birmingham in the peaks - one busy station is no excuse for downgrading the rest of the journey experience on a long route. If you have a local service in an urban area, stopping 15 times in an hour, then you might need to prioritise dwell times but please - not on an inter-urban (semi-)fast (ie. regional express) service.
Did the TfW refresh include re-padding the seats on the 175s? If not, that needs doing as some of the seats have a nasty hard rod sticking into your back where the padding has gone.
Exactly: a massive shame for the passenger if these units have to go for scrap, but hopefully the corrosion can be sorted. Some (admittedly much older, but presumably had corriosion-protection from new) stock (mark 3s spring to mind) has been said to be in a shocking condition before but has been repaired.
I was thinking more the stopper from Leicester arrives at New Street and forms the Stansted and vice versa. To separate out the stopper from the express therefore requires a rewrite unless it isn’t diagrammed this way anymore of course.
Could the services not be extended to Swansea as an alternative to avoid terminating at Cardiff which has its own issues or using the bay platform at Bridgend
As I understand it 175s wouldn't be a good fit for the Stansted service anyway, as it needs stock which can do Sprinter differential speeds, so the Cardiff workings are the only place XC could really make use of the 175s. A pitty as the Stansted service deserves better stock really - maybe it will get some if the Midlands plans with a more frequent Birmingham-Leicester service (possibly from Moor Street instead of New Street) come off.
XC do run a mixture of 170s the 170\1 are the original 170s ordered by Midland Mainline after the first batch of Chiltern 168s. Then there are the later 170\6 which were ordered by Central Trains plus the two odd 170 397/398 Porterbrook speculative builds.
Yet 175116 somehow got diagramed to Pembroke dock and presumably Fishguard fingers crossed things improve but at least the substitutions were 158s twice they're still nice trains
Yes i do like the 158s a lot. Infact before the 175s had their refurbishment the 158s were my favourites from ATW/TFW.
Yes there was a further 158 working to Pembroke dock today that however formed off the cardiff-Pembroke dock arriving at 10:15
I think that very good image of the Chiltern one shows they’d look very smart in Chiltern livery. They don’t look half as bad as I thought they would in Northern either.
It's very unlikely- but I'd welcome 175s being added to Northern's fleet of trains. Even 3-car 195s are often very near full, if not full and standing- particularly on the Calder Valley services- Blackpool to York/Manchester to Leeds via Todmorden services. It'll of course be even busier on Summer Saturdays, particularly to/from Blackpool. So 175s could be used to supplement the 195s- allowing more 195s to double up for more capacity.
these drawings are very good! could you do a WMT or LNWR livery, please?
If you were going to do parcels experiements, I would suggest that the 197s (with their wider doors and reduced passenger accomodation) would be a better choice for the parcels work with the 175s retained for the passenger workings.
Rather than replacing some of the 195s on the York-Blackpool route and doubling-up others, I would aim to replace ALL the 195s on York-Blackpool with 175s and cascade the 195s to the stopping services through Warrington Central, allowing Northern to withdraw 150/1s (possibly after salvaging the seats since the modern railway don't appear to be able to buy new seats with cusioning at the moment).
Probably need a gritting lorry, not a pinch of salt, for that to work out.
EMR would also be ideal for the 175 to replace the 158. There are 27 of them vs 26 158's, Plus about half of them are already 3 cars so they can easily can work in 4-6 cars, has a higher top speed, larger toilets etc. Seating Capacity is also very similar (134 per 2 car vs 158's 138 ish). Im not sure the acceleration between the two but i expect that'll also be similar.
