Should Voyagers be converted into bi-modes?

[RobShipway]

Moderator note: split from https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/class-221-for-grand-central.249024/

If was not for the fact that they are twenty years old and I know when it Bombardier, it was going to cost an absolute fortune to do, but I do wonder whether it would still be better for Alstom to build an extra carriage for the class 221, to turn them into bi-mode trains with an OHLE carriage being added?

However, given that many operators have gone for newer trains with longer carriages, I suspect that will be the way that Grand Central also go?

 

[skyhigh]

but I do wonder whether it would still be better for Alstom to build an extra carriage for the class 221, to turn them into bi-mode trains with an OHLE carriage being added?

No.

 

[Energy]

If was not for the fact that they are twenty years old and I know when it Bombardier, it was going to cost an absolute fortune to do, but I do wonder whether it would still be better for Alstom to build an extra carriage for the class 221, to turn them into bi-mode trains with an OHLE carriage being added?

However, given that many operators have gone for newer trains with longer carriages, I suspect that will be the way that Grand Central also go?

No. Voyagers lack a traction bus so you'd either have to retrofit one at great expense or have very powerful motors on the pantograph car.

An extra carriage was considered a little over a decade ago. It was pretty quickly found that it would be really expensive, a fairly small order and that they'd be built in Belgium as Derby can't build steel bodied vehicles.

Tagging on a few IETs for XC (though these never materialised) made more sense.

 

[swt_passenger]

No. Voyagers lack a traction bus so you'd either have to retrofit one at great expense or have very powerful motors on the pantograph car.

An extra carriage was considered a little over a decade ago. It was pretty quickly found that it would be really expensive, a fairly small order and that they'd be built in Belgium as Derby can't build steel bodied vehicles.

Yes, and every year that has gone by since then has subtracted another year from the possible payback period. As it was not considered cost effective when the class was just over 10 years old, it never will be now. I’m surprised it still gets asked about.

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

Yes, and every year that has gone by since then has subtracted another year from the possible payback period. As it was not considered cost effective when the class was just over 10 years old, it never will be now. I’m surprised it still gets asked about.

People just don’t seem to believe that playing around and modifying older trains is hardly ever cost-effective or indeed a success, it seems. See 230, 600, 769, 799, etc.

 

[MarkyT]

No. Voyagers lack a traction bus so you'd either have to retrofit one at great expense or have very powerful motors on the pantograph car.

Indeed, each car is self contained from a traction point of view. Hybridisation with a moderately sized traction battery on each vehicle would be more practical using the existing electric transmission. 3rd rail pickup on each car might also be possible as that wouldn't need a main stepdown transformer but unlikely to be worth it considering the limited mileage covered on DC infrastructure.

 

[GRALISTAIR]

I really don't think it would be a good idea because of everything everyone has said above.

 

[MarkyT]

People just don’t seem to believe that playing around and modifying older trains is hardly ever cost-effective or indeed a success, it seems. See 230, 600, 769, 799, etc.

Certainly adding diesel generators to old electric trains seems problematic, but the electric only D-trains on the IOW seem ok and adding traction batteries is a lot easier than I.C. engines, fuel tanks etc. Much easier if modular flexibility is designed in from the outset though, like the latest Stadler stock.

 

[Trainbike46]

Moderator note: split from https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/class-221-for-grand-central.249024/

If was not for the fact that they are twenty years old and I know when it Bombardier, it was going to cost an absolute fortune to do, but I do wonder whether it would still be better for Alstom to build an extra carriage for the class 221, to turn them into bi-mode trains with an OHLE carriage being added?

However, given that many operators have gone for newer trains with longer carriages, I suspect that will be the way that Grand Central also go?

Turning a diesel Multiple unit into a bimode would be really expensive, the result would probably not be reliable enough, and it would generally be much better and cheaper to send the voyagers to sims and buy new 8xx/FLIRTs/SMILEs/Other 200 km/h bimode stock new

 

[MarkyT]

Turning a diesel Multiple unit into a bimode would be really expensive, the result would probably not be reliable enough, and it would generally be much better and cheaper to send the voyagers to sims and buy new 8xx/FLIRTs/SMILEs/Other 200 km/h bimode stock new

Definitely the case with mechanical/hydraulic transmission. Chiltern tried to hybridise such a DMU, unsuccessfully it appears. If the target train has electric transmission already however it might be worth considering, but not in the case of the Voyagers.

 

[Halish Railway]

Voyagers regardless of their source of traction are an inherently flawed design that ought to be replaced by something newer.

Even if they ran on electric they’d still have way too many space-inefficient accessible toilets, cramped seating and small overhead racks.

 

[HamworthyGoods]

Voyagers regardless of their source of traction are an inherently flawed design that ought to be replaced by something newer.

Even if they ran on electric they’d still have way too many space-inefficient accessible toilets, cramped seating and small overhead racks.

Why are they and inherently flawed design? They have high levels of reliability.

 

[43096]

Why are they and inherently flawed design? They have high levels of reliability.

They are deeply inefficient in terms of space utilisation.

 

[dk1]

Project Thor died a death years ago. No option or po8nt doing it now Voyagers are over half way through their operational life & would be much older before anything came to fruition. Better to buy new & cascade them to Scotrail.

 

[cle]

Project Thor died a death years ago. No option or po8nt doing it now Voyagers are over half way through their operational life & would be much older before anything came to fruition. Better to buy new & cascade them to Scotrail.

Agree on this. Send them to higher speed, inter-regional routes with reasonable gaps in calls - for which 4 or 5 car stock would be an upgrade.

Norwich-Derby and Stansted-Birmingham spring to mind, or indeed the other EM XCs like Cardiff-Nottingham. Scotrail's CB -> Aberdeen and Inverness routes make sense too. Cardiff-Manchester or the Cardiff-Holyhead might fit too. Even EWR as it stands...

 

[dk1]

Agree on this. Send them to higher speed, inter-regional routes with reasonable gaps in calls - for which 4 or 5 car stock would be an upgrade.

Norwich-Derby and Stansted-Birmingham spring to mind, or indeed the other EM XCs like Cardiff-Nottingham. Scotrail's CB -> Aberdeen and Inverness routes make sense too. Cardiff-Manchester or the Cardiff-Holyhead might fit too. Even EWR as it stands...

East Anglia is no good as Voyagers cannot operate at SP speeds across some parts of the Fens. For example Ely-Lakenheath would be 45mph.

 

[JonathanH]

Send them to higher speed, inter-regional routes with reasonable gaps in calls - for which 4 or 5 car stock would be an upgrade.

Norwich-Derby and Stansted-Birmingham spring to mind, or indeed the other EM XCs like Cardiff-Nottingham.

Short of a massive interior upgrade, they simply don't provide an uplift in capacity on these routes, which is what you would need to offer, given the higher running costs, and of course the sprinter speed differential issue.

 

[Whistler40145]

Probably cost more to convert the Voyagers than new build

 

[dk1]

Probably cost more to convert the Voyagers than new build

Exactly. Totally pointless & hence why it’ll never happen now.

 

[Whistler40145]

Exactly. Totally pointless & hence why it’ll never happen now.

Plus, you'd currently require Diesel, 25kv and 3rd Rail capable units

 

[RailWonderer]

It's a nice idea but it would be prohibitively expensive for mid-life units. You only have to look at the 769 debacle and the Voyagers are more technically complex units, not 1980s BR dogboxes. While Scotrail is the best place for them they did signal a while back they did not want them (some language used in a prospective tender about smelly toilets) and Meridians would be a better fit for Scotrail anyway.

Other than XC the Voyagers are IC DMUs which itself is a niche segment with many routes not at 125mph or even 90mph speeds. Heavier units on smaller lower speed lines would carry heavy track access charges.

 

[zwk500]

Here's an old thread on a similar theme: https://www.railforums.co.uk/thread...rs-so-they-could-become-bi-mode-units.129788/

 

[The Ham]

No. Voyagers lack a traction bus so you'd either have to retrofit one at great expense or have very powerful motors on the pantograph car.

An extra carriage was considered a little over a decade ago. It was pretty quickly found that it would be really expensive, a fairly small order and that they'd be built in Belgium as Derby can't build steel bodied vehicles.

Tagging on a few IETs for XC (though these never materialised) made more sense.

Whilst I also agree that the theory sounds good but the practice be rubbish (read expensive), there is one point (IIRC) which could have made it more viable when it was first proposed.

The issue, as I understand it, was that to have a 6 coach train meant adding 2 OHLE coaches, so that's a lot of extra coaches for the circa 40 sets which are already 5 coaches long (let's say 80, plus the 38 for the 220's and 4 coach 221's).

Also you can't double up 6 coach units, making it harder to operate them in service.

If however they swapped out 1 coach from the 5 coach units to create a universal 5 coach fleet other than 20 which you lengthen to 9 coaches (broadly the same capacity as a 5+5) by adding 2 OHLE coaches and 2 of the released existing coaches.

Whilst not a large reduction (60 rather than 80), it could have allowed the early retirement of the HST's (would have needed 5 of the 20 as direct replacements, plus another 5 to cover for the 5 used to replace the HST's) and the cost savings that would have brought about whilst giving XC a fairly standard fleet (as well as all the other benefits of the original plan).

The one down side would be the need for longer train jacks for maintenance, however with it being a limited fleet size or could be that the 10 not needed to replace the XC units would end up with Virgin (as was at the time) and could have potentially used the train jacks for their 390's with a deal to allow XC to use them for their 10.

Obviously it's never going to happen, and arguably a new set of trains should be ordered for XC whilst there's still time to use the 22x's elsewhere for a reasonable time.

 

[JonathanH]

Obviously it's never going to happen, and arguably a new set of trains should be ordered for XC whilst there's still time to use the 22x's elsewhere for a reasonable time.

There isn't anywhere else sensible to send the 22x units, and the railway isn't under any obligation to continue to lease them beyond current agreements.

If a new bi-mode fleet is to be ordered, noting that there may well be manufacturing capacity at present, the impact on the railway's finances of binning the 22x fleet after only 22 years is a consideration, although we might note that the IET was only procured on a 27.5 year time frame.

The second issue is whether the funds actually exist for an increase in the CrossCountry fleet size based on new units, and the associated maintenance and stabling requirements, which is a huge project.

This latter point, around maintenance and stabling requirements is also an issue if it were possible to extend the Voyagers to longer units as part of a bi-mode project, even more so if they went longer than 5 coaches.

 

[D365]

People just don’t seem to believe that playing around and modifying older trains is hardly ever cost-effective or indeed a success, it seems. See 230, 600, 769, 799, etc.

People like to play engineer!

 

[RobShipway]

People like to play engineer!

People just don’t seem to believe that playing around and modifying older trains is hardly ever cost-effective or indeed a success, it seems. See 230, 600, 769, 799, etc.

I was not in anyway suggesting it should happen, given as you say @TT-ONR-NRN has happened to other older units. I was just asking the thoughts of people was it likely to happen? I certainly was not expecting the question to be created into a new thread in the speculation section!

@D365 To answer your point, certainly for me it is not about playing engineer. It is about seeing if there is a way to give both enthusiasts and the public the railway service that they want to travel on. If that means to some that I play at being engineer, then so be it.

 

[spotify95]

I would be very surprised indeed if the idea of converting old diesel trains to electric was to go ahead, especially the 22x series. The 22x series is a diesel intercity train, and given it has never been designed for electric use from the start, the costs needed to convert them to electric would be completely unfeasible. Such a conversion would also probably make them less efficient than brand new electric or bi-mode units.
If Grand Central or CrossCountry wanted bi-mode trains, it would be much more feasible to just order and buy a fleet of new Class 80x IETs, rather than mess around with converting mid life cycle Voyagers (or Super Voyagers) into electric units.

If you really want electric capable trains - buy new IETs, send the Voyagers to Newport Sims. Problem solved.

 

[Benters]

I would be very surprised indeed if the idea of converting old diesel trains to electric was to go ahead, especially the 22x series. The 22x series is a diesel intercity train, and given it has never been designed for electric use from the start, the costs needed to convert them to electric would be completely unfeasible. Such a conversion would also probably make them less efficient than brand new electric or bi-mode units.
If Grand Central or CrossCountry wanted bi-mode trains, it would be much more feasible to just order and buy a fleet of new Class 80x IETs, rather than mess around with converting mid life cycle Voyagers (or Super Voyagers) into electric units.

If you really want electric capable trains - buy new IETs, send the Voyagers to Newport Sims. Problem solved.

Spot on. Couldn't agree more.

 

[WAO]

My choice would be class 810's for XC, as supplied to EMR. After all, the Midland Railway was a single system, with St Pancras only the London extension.

As soon as some are available, all XC services North of Leeds could be worked by them. Infill electrification would then be viable especially where other services would share the wires.

However I do like the XC Voyagers, even with the smells and have experienced very good timekeeping over a decade of travelling - much better than GWR. The UK doesn't have the skills needed to convert them to OLE supply.

WAO

 

[dk1]

If you really want electric capable trains - buy new IETs, send the Voyagers to Newport Sims. Problem solved.

Use as many of the 22X fleet to replace HSTs on Scotrail & longer distance GWR regional services first.