IEP for beginners

[AndyLandy]

Presumably there would be a driver change, with the replacement ready and waiting, possibly at the front of the platform already.

Which raises my next point, you'd need more drivers and/or drivers to sign multiple traction types. With IEP you'd just sign the one.

Thats fair enough but at least you are not discounting the idea.

I'm prepared to entertain lots of different suggestions. But I genuinely suspect that bi-mode presents the most advantages.

For what it's worth, it's only reading around the subject and seeing all the points and counter-points that I've rationalised such an opinion.

 

[Dave1987]

Exactly - you'd need to introduce driver changes on routes that currently have none.

Or, with bi-mode IEP, you just press a button.

You could rearrange the diagrams so that drivers had their PNB's at the "hook up" station or have them just take another service the other way.

It takes seconds to attach with the new delner couplers. Im fairly certain with diesels on trains it not like a car so you cannot just push a button and go. I dont sign any diesel traction so if Im wrong on that can someone who does sign diesels correct me please.
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Which raises my next point, you'd need more drivers and/or drivers to sign multiple traction types. With IEP you'd just sign the one.



I'm prepared to entertain lots of different suggestions. But I genuinely suspect that bi-mode presents the most advantages.

For what it's worth, it's only reading around the subject and seeing all the points and counter-points that I've rationalised such an opinion.

I feel that IEP is incredibly expensive for what it is and I cannot see the merit in wasting massive amounts of energy. And as someone else posted if Hitatchi hadnt put so much money into it they would have cancelled the project.

 

[HSTEd]

I feel that IEP is incredibly expensive for what it is and I cannot see the merit in wasting massive amounts of energy.

What about the absurd amount of money you are proposing to waste hauling dead EMU traction equipment under diesel power?

You are effectively duplicating in the locomotive what the EMU already has.

The locomotive weighs in at 80t at the lightest and will be replacing 20t of diesel generator equipment carried aboard the bi-mode.

 

[RAGNARØKR]

Having grown up with a model railway, I can see the attraction of lots of shunting movements, but a busy station like Leeds or Edinburgh isn't the place to be doing it.

Lots of shunting movements? How many a day? And when? And what is going on at Leeds?

 

[Dave1987]

What about the absurd amount of money you are proposing to waste hauling dead EMU traction equipment under diesel power?

You are effectively duplicating in the locomotive what the EMU already has.

The locomotive weighs in at 80t at the lightest and will be replacing 20t of diesel generator equipment carried aboard the bi-mode.

Are you sure all the diesel engines on a 10 car IEP would weigh 20t? The engines on the voyagers on their own weigh 2t without taking all the exhaust, fuel tank, fuel and other components into consideration! At least you have not hauled excessive weight for most of the journey.
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Lots of shunting movements? How many a day? And when? And what is going on at Leeds?

The moves would only have to be into a spur hardly the biggest movement in the world. And like I said before Im pretty sure with these big diesel engines you cannot just start them up and then straight away ask them for full revs.

 

[RAGNARØKR]

I honestly believe loco hauling when the wires end is the best solution to the problem. It also seems to be the least expensive.

Yes and it is a safe assumption that the traffic density off the wires is lower or it would be worth electrifying.

So you do something like push 12 cars to the end of the wired route, then split the train and diesel haul the front half of the train to the end of the route. Or half the train has enough power to push/pull the half that goes all the way.

On the way back the train is diesel-pushed to the wired point, then the loco stays behind and the front half goes back to "London".

How many through trains are there anyway between London and Aberdeen? And why not move the changeover point from Edinburgh to another place which is not quite so busy eg Dundee?
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Is that you finally suggesting a "major infrastructure upgrade"

Except that, of course, IEP doesn't need that because it can have an extra coach in the space that a 225 set "wastes" with the engine and DVT.

Hardy major, the buffer stops were moved and the track shortened to create shopping areas.
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.I would say that you would be very hard pushed to find the room for conflicting light engine movements. Not only that but Waverley is likely to get busier in years to come but you want to block this with unnecesary loco moves. And where do you propose to stable the diesel loco at Waverley?

Trust me the situation would be no better at Haymarket given that everything from Waverley passes through Haymarket.

How long will it be before the wires get to Dundee in the years to come when you say Waverley will get busier

Of course it does! The size of the population dictates how many trains and seats you need.

It also dictates how much money there is to spend. No excuse. The reverse in fact. But if people WANT to travel like cattle and are happy to defend policies that force them to I suppose it is their choice. Just seems strange to me.

 

[AndyLandy]

If you have a bi-mode train first you are wasing vast amounts of energy hauling a dead diesel engine under the wires

Does anyone actually care about that?

Seriously, genuine question. For domestic fuel bills, electricity is considerably more expensive than gas for the same energy output. Is electricity actually cheaper, or are we doing this because it's ostensibly "greener" and thus more politically astute?

Not that I'm debating the rights and wrongs of the matter, just offering up a possible suggestion as to why.

 

[Dave1987]

Just had a chat with my father about this just to confirm a few points (my father is senior management at a TOC, but not the one I work for ). He has confirmed that dragging dead diesel engines under the wires would be incredibly expensive and almost defeat the point of electrifying anyway. He did point out though that the current class 57+ pendolino arrangement could not be repeated and that the loco would need to be specifically designed to couple with the electric traction. But the loco's could be used in future for other purposes such as freight once the wires are up all the way but they would need modifing again for this.

His words not mine I hassen to add!

 

[HSTEd]

Are you sure all the diesel engines on a 10 car IEP would weigh 20t? The engines on the voyagers on their own weigh 2t without taking all the exhaust, fuel tank, fuel and other components into consideration! At least you have not hauled excessive weight for most of the journey.

I only need five engines to beat your Eurolight hauled formation.
20t is a reasonable weight including fuel and the generators et al.
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Seriously, genuine question. For domestic fuel bills, electricity is considerably more expensive than gas for the same energy output. Is electricity actually cheaper, or are we doing this because it's ostensibly "greener" and thus more politically astute?

Perhaps for heating.

But diesel engines are only about 30-40% efficient at best.

Electric transmissions can be 90+% efficient.

And diesel costs drastically more than gas per unit energy

 

[Dave1987]

Do you actually know how much TOC's pay for electric compared with diesel? Plus I wonder how much It would cost each journey to haul that dead diesel engine. That cost would have to go on ticket prices.

 

[AndyLandy]

Perhaps for heating.

But diesel engines are only about 30-40% efficient at best.

Electric transmissions can be 90+% efficient.

And diesel costs drastically more than gas per unit energy

OK, that's useful to know. Do you happen to know the differences between DMMU, DHMU and DEMU by any chance?

Do you actually know how much TOC's pay for electric compared with diesel? Plus I wonder how much It would cost each journey to haul that dead diesel engine. That cost would have to go on ticket prices.

Very interesting and relevant question. I also wonder what the cost difference between the two fuels is, as paid by the railways, or more succinctly, what impact it has on the overall cost of these different traction packages we're discussing.

 

[rebmcr]

if people WANT to travel like cattle and are happy to defend policies that force them to I suppose it is their choice. Just seems strange to me.

Money is a huge factor here. If the sort of accommodation you're talking about were attractive to the majority of travellers at the price it would need to be at, our First Class carriages would be full whilst Standard would be near-empty.

Of course, the opposite is true. Everybody would love marvellously spacious seating, but we have to be realistic about cold hard cash.

 

[ainsworth74]

Those figures make IEP look expensive. But aren't the IEP figures the total cost (including depots/ maintenance) whilst the other figures are just the lease costs?

The 390 figures will presumably cover the total service provision contract that VT have with Alstom which is very similar to the IEP deal (it just doesn't include capital costs of new depots as I believe refurbished ones were used).

Hardy major, the buffer stops were moved and the track shortened to create shopping areas.

You can't be very familiar with Kings Cross then. There's coach (plus maybe another half) to be gained on platforms 5, 6, 7 and 8. But for platforms 1, 2, 3 and 4 you're going to building out through the front of the station (the original front no shortening here) if you want to lengthen the platforms that way. Platform 0 would require you to knock through the ground floor of a building.

 

[RAGNARØKR]

The 390 figures will presumably cover the total service provision contract that VT have with Alstom which is very similar to the IEP deal (it just doesn't include capital costs of new depots as I believe refurbished ones were used).

You can't be very familiar with Kings Cross then. There's coach (plus maybe another half) to be gained on platforms 5, 6, 7 and 8. But for platforms 1, 2, 3 and 4 you're going to building out through the front of the station (the original front no shortening here) if you want to lengthen the platforms that way. Platform 0 would require you to knock through the ground floor of a building.

Trains had up to 17 x 57 foot coaches in steam days. What has happened to the station since then to reduce the capacity as drastically as appears to be the case? And does the IEP actually take up the full length of even the present platforms? A loco is not as long as a coach. And the DVT contains space for stuff that would otherwise have to go inside the vehicles eg luggage and thereby reduce space for seating.

And there is still the option of an EMU with all the power in half a set as in the Bournemouth line REPs, which gets rid of the reason for objecting to loco-haulage beyond the wires, thereby undermining the case for bi-mode.
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Money is a huge factor here. If the sort of accommodation you're talking about were attractive to the majority of travellers at the price it would need to be at, our First Class carriages would be full whilst Standard would be near-empty.

Of course, the opposite is true. Everybody would love marvellously spacious seating, but we have to be realistic about cold hard cash.

How come the standard class in Swedish trains is about equal to first class in Britain, but fares are roughly the same? The railways have not been unduly subsidised for years.

I wonder if some cold hard cash is not going down a big deep drain?

 

[ainsworth74]

Trains had up to 17 x 57 foot coaches in steam days. What has happened to the station since then to reduce the capacity as drastically as appears to be the case?

By using the four longest platforms that could accommodate (just) such a formation even today?

And does the IEP actually take up the full length of even the present platforms?

Well the longest version of IEP will be 10 x 26m vehicles (two 5-coach bi-modes) so 260m total length. According to the Section Appendix platform one is 294.6m, platform two 293m, platform three 292m, platform four 291m, platform five 278m, platform six 286m, platform seven 286m, platform eight 276m. So all the long distance platforms can comfortable accomodate 10 car IEP (and indeed a bit more).

And there is still the option of an EMU with all the power in half a set as in the Bournemouth line REPs, which gets rid of the reason for objecting to loco-haulage beyond the wires, thereby undermining the case for bi-mode.

I've never had a problem with loco-hauling an EMU to cover the off-wire sections of the routes in question.

 

[rebmcr]

How come the standard class in Swedish trains is about equal to first class in Britain, but fares are roughly the same? The railways have not been unduly subsidised for years.

I wonder if some cold hard cash is not going down a big deep drain?

Stop comparing Sweden to Britain. It's a completely different system with completely different demands placed on it.

Perhaps there has been money wasted all the way through BR, RT+TOCs, and NR+TOCs. Buying a fleet of luxury cruise-ships-on-bogies isn't how to fix it.

 

[sprinterguy]

Trains had up to 17 x 57 foot coaches in steam days. What has happened to the station since then to reduce the capacity as drastically as appears to be the case? And does the IEP actually take up the full length of even the present platforms? A loco is not as long as a coach. And the DVT contains space for stuff that would otherwise have to go inside the vehicles eg luggage and thereby reduce space for seating.

Not every train was seventeen carriages in length though by any means, as with the platform lengths quoted above such a length of train (Seventeen mark ones plus a loco works out at just over 300 metres) would likely be fouling the turnout for adjacent platforms, and in steam days, with semaphore signalling, there was less concern about locos standing beyond the starting signal, which these days is a definite no-no. Ainsworth74's estimates at an extra carriage and a half being the maximum length of train that could be accommodated in the platforms at Kings Cross are pretty accurate if you consider that an eleven carriage 225 formation, two carriages longer than the present formation, works out at 293 metres in length.

 

[RobShipway]

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How come the standard class in Swedish trains is about equal to first class in Britain, but fares are roughly the same? The railways have not been unduly subsidised for years.

I wonder if some cold hard cash is not going down a big deep drain?

Your comment makes me think that you are jealous that with our larger population we will have a better and cheaper railway with using IEP with the existing foundations of our railway system than any Swedish can only dream about in their lifetime.

Even if you go back to the start of trains for the world i.e Stephensons Rocket the carriages where such that people where crammed in, however if you look at the trains in places like India, if you cannot get a seat and there is no roof to stand then you have to travel on the roof. Would you prefer that we had trains like that, as your suggestion about trains would lead that to happen here in the UK with the amount of people travelling on trains here in the Uk in the increase year after year for the last 8 - 10 years, despite the cost in fares.

 

[tbtc]

For what it's worth, it's only reading around the subject and seeing all the points and counter-points that I've rationalised such an opinion.

My view on IEP is much like my view on HS2 - started off unimpressed, but realistically its as good an option as we are going to get and is better than the alternatives. Am not a huge cheerleader for either, just pragmatic about the lack of something better.

You could rearrange the diagrams so that drivers had their PNB's at the "hook up" station or have them just take another service the other way

Not ideal though

It takes seconds to attach with the new delner couplers. Im fairly certain with diesels on trains it not like a car so you cannot just push a button and go. I dont sign any diesel traction so if Im wrong on that can someone who does sign diesels correct me please

I don't know whether it'll be as simple as the AC/ DC switchover, whether you'd start the diesel engines as you approach Leeds/ Edinburgh/ Oxford so that they'd be revved up on departure

How many through trains are there anyway between London and Aberdeen?

So we've had all of these arguments about the practicalities of loco shunting at Edinburgh Waverley without you knowing about how often they'd happen?

And why not move the changeover point from Edinburgh to another place which is not quite so busy eg Dundee?

Because Dundee is unelectrified. And by the time the line through Fife to Dundee is wired, the electrification team will be continuing to Aberdeen.

One advantage of bi-mode IEP is that you can gradually extend the electrification so that the switchover point gets further away from London

if people WANT to travel like cattle and are happy to defend policies that force them to I suppose it is their choice. Just seems strange to me

I love it when you get all passive aggressive...

Do you actually know how much TOC's pay for electric compared with diesel? Plus I wonder how much It would cost each journey to haul that dead diesel engine. That cost would have to go on ticket prices

Presumably you'd be happy for the ticket prices to include the cost of hauling a 91 plus DVT all the way from Edinburgh to Inverness (that's a fair bit of dead weight for the "68" to haul over the hills)?

That's got to be well over a hundred tonnes (91+DVT)? And much less efficient to get a "68" to haul a hundred tonnes of extra weight than for an electric IEP to haul an equivalent amount under the wires?

Money is a huge factor here. If the sort of accommodation you're talking about were attractive to the majority of travellers at the price it would need to be at, our First Class carriages would be full whilst Standard would be near-empty.

Of course, the opposite is true. Everybody would love marvellously spacious seating, but we have to be realistic about cold hard cash.

Well said.

 

[sprinterguy]

What is the body length of a Mk3 in comparison anyway - is the 23m over the coach ends or over the coupling - in which case a Mk3 might only be 22m long for our purposes.

Mark 3 vehicles are 22.57 metres long over the body ends - 23 metres is the length over the gangway ends.

 

[ainsworth74]

Presumably you'd be happy for the ticket prices to include the cost of hauling a 91 plus DVT all the way from Edinburgh to Inverness (that's a fair bit of dead weight for the "68" to haul over the hills)?

I have a 91 as weighing about 80 tonnes and a DVT 40 tonnes so say 120 tonnes overall.

 

[jon0844]

Stop comparing Sweden to Britain. It's a completely different system with completely different demands placed on it.

Standard class on a train in Sweden isn't like first class here anyway, at least not FC on an Intercity train. Compared to FC on a 317/1 maybe!!

Wider trains do make standard more spacious and you can have 3+2 (even 3+3?) seating with plenty of room but our trains can't be that wide. The trains regularly compared are also extreme inaccessible for wheelchairs and buggies, possibly having just one set of doors you can get on/off at.

 

[AndyLandy]

My view on IEP is much like my view on HS2 - started off unimpressed, but realistically its as good an option as we are going to get and is better than the alternatives. Am not a huge cheerleader for either, just pragmatic about the lack of something better.

I guess I'm firmly in the same camp. I was pretty nonplussed about HS2 and IEP when I first heard about them, but as I've followed the discussions through, I've largely come to the conclusion that they're about as good as we can realistically manage.

I love it when you get all passive aggressive...

I nearly spat my coffee over my keyboard reading that!

Mark 3 vehicles are 22.57 metres long over the body ends - 23 metres is the length over the gangway ends.

And just to clarify (in case anyone's in any doubt), the IEP proposed design document has the IEP intermediate vehicles as 25m over the body ends and 26m over the gangway ends.

 

[RobShipway]

I guess I'm firmly in the same camp. I was pretty nonplussed about HS2 and IEP when I first heard about them, but as I've followed the discussions through, I've largely come to the conclusion that they're about as good as we can realistically manage.



I nearly spat my coffee over my keyboard reading that!



And just to clarify (in case anyone's in any doubt), the IEP proposed design document has the IEP intermediate vehicles as 25m over the body ends and 26m over the gangway ends.

There is a few of us that are sceptical about HS2 and IEP, but as I mentioned before that is no different to how people where with the HST being introduced as before them the nearest thing to it was the Blue Pullman trains, which where retired some years earlier. However, I think more people where sceptical of the APT then which even though it failed, the ideas from it are working on the WCML line today in the form of the Class 390.

 

[AndyLandy]

There is a few of us that are sceptical about HS2 and IEP, but as I mentioned before that is no different to how people where with the HST being introduced as before them the nearest thing to it was the Blue Pullman trains, which where retired some years earlier. However, I think more people where sceptical of the APT then which even though it failed, the ideas from it are working on the WCML line today in the form of the Class 390.

I made a similarly related post about this many moons ago when I'd only recently joined here. I think it was about enthusiasts in 30-40 odd years and whether they'd look back with reverence at the trains we are currently dissing.

"Aye, but none of your modern rubbish! Those Maglev Skytrains are uncomfortable and noisy. Give me a Voyager any day! Now those come from an era when we knew how to build trains!"

 

[Manchester77]

Oh god this has become ANOTHER IEP debate/argument:')

 

[AndyLandy]

Oh god this has become ANOTHER IEP debate/argument:')

Quelle Surprise, eh?

I suspect that if you ever mention IEP or HS2, you will eventually end up with a 100-page thread of rant and opinion. We could probably create our own variant of Godwin's law for the phenomena.

 

[RobShipway]

Oh god this has become ANOTHER IEP debate/argument:')

Possibly.... But I really hope not, as it should be what is best for the country and sceptical people like me in in their early 40's are probably going to be proved wrong about them just as my father and Grandfathers where wrong that the HST trains would not catch on back in 1976....

 

[Manchester77]

Aha I'd imagine that if this forum was here in the 60s/70s we'd have people talking about how the new class 252/3s will need too much money being put into clearances and platform extensions and that the class 55s are more reliable etc etc etc

Times change, people change, opinions change

 

[Dave1987]

Presumably you'd be happy for the ticket prices to include the cost of hauling a 91 plus DVT all the way from Edinburgh to Inverness (that's a fair bit of dead weight for the "68" to haul over the hills)?

That's got to be well over a hundred tonnes (91+DVT)? And much less efficient to get a "68" to haul a hundred tonnes of extra weight than for an electric IEP to haul an equivalent amount under the wires?

No hauling a 91+ DVT with a diesel would not be worth it but seeing as the "225's" are by no means life expired and there are wires up for them to use on the east coast then that is a side issue.

I think the crucial difference between the HS2 (which I am fully in faovour of) argument and the IEP argument is this:

The WCML is full and Im sure we can all agree on that point, building HS2 will relieve pressure on it and there is no other real cheaper solution to this.

IEP on the other hand does have cheaper alternatives. The way I look at it is that the DFT have got an idea in their head that they want bi-mode trains and they are not willing to listen to any other option apart from the one they want to hear. I think loco hauling electric traction has be proven to work with the 57's+pendo's the only real problem with these two is the fact they were never designed to be coupled together. If from the outset a loco (possibly class 68's) was designed to couple to a electric train using the delner coupler it would prob have few problems.