Great Western Coffee Shop

how many others think that FGW has done a good job on refreshing their HST fleet. I think they're great and try to plan journeys around the 'H' in the timetable! How many agree, or disagree? as many replies as possible please!

all that glitters is not gold... they look realy good very modern i cant fault them in that respect, airline seats pros and cons.... pros more private more room for passengers to sit...cons not great for familys or groups

build quality well time will see luckly passengers in this area are alot more civilized if you look at the voyagers they are no wlooking very tatty but to be fair fgw seem to be doing a great job on maintanance and cleaning these days

end of the day were always going to view our journeys on them as overcrowded and delayed which taints your view of the units if they were not overcrowded and always ontime then i think you would find more people happy with them, only way to fix it is more trains

More FGW HST's would be good to sort overcrowding!

Well, this is certainly a very popular subject for discussion!

For example, there's a huge amount of useful information on a previous topic on this forum, at http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=2578.0  ;)

hst refurb seems to be better than the west fleet,sugar coated turd springs to mind for the local stuff

i think the 150's refresh is very good

they look ok to start with but do not wear very well,have you seen the inside of cabs?
in my opinion 158's were the best but they are looking tired already.

i havnt been on a 158 yet and to be fair i have only been on a handfull of refreshed 150's i think there is an ongoing issue with refreshes they look great but there not built to last a full on 142 refresh would probably prove to be quite amusing they cant make them worse

Why is this? SWTs 158s/159s were refurbed before FGW's and still look as good as new.

im kinda a fan of swt even tho im in devon in sidmouth with no station and 90% of the stations within a 50 mile area are fgw my closest stations are ran by swt (whimple and honiton)

On a couple of mornings last week, I was presented with a refurbished three-car 158 for my journey into Bristol - and I was impressed, to be honest!  I think they are indeed the greatest beneficiaries of the refurbishment programme.  ;)

Still catching the 0859 then Chris? Though I had assumed that it was more by chance that a 3 coach set was rostered, on a couple of days it has been a 2 car 158 + 153, so it is clearly deliberate. 

Yes, John, I'm a glutton for the 08:59!

All too often we get a tatty old 143, so a 158 is a real treat!  ::)

IMO the only improvement on the 150's was the reduction in the blinding lighting levels.

For the 158's unfortunately FGW didn't get much opportunity to put the same amount of effort SWT did into their spec. IRRC FGW had promised customer info systems, improved air con etc etc, none of which appeared, let alone other mechanicals that may have been considered.

The long term maintenance has also I'm sure have been affected by a lack of an equivalent dedicated facilities that SWT have in Salisbury. What happened to SPM.  ???

Give the 158 fleet another 12 months and they will be ready for another refresh.  :'(

Its still pretty blinding at night, what is the need to use white fluorescent tubes? Voyagers have lighting (IMHO) spot on!

Try 6am with a hangover.... >:( >:(

SWT had a bigger budget and better refurb spec,also the maintainence is far superior to FGW probably because they only have one class of train to look after and more spare sets so can stop them for repairs etc.

Yes, but let's not forget that the franchise bid, by Alison Forster and her First team, set the budget and also the number of trains they needed - so that although you are, I'm sure, on the right track it's through choice of the companies concerned and not just down to the luck of the draw. First chose to squeeze budgets, and to squeeze passengers.

Didn't SWT used to run some 170 units (?) from Salisbury too?  Was the maintainance there os a significantly lower standard before they switched to a nearer-uniform fleet of just two classes - 158s and 159s?

And on a positive note for FGW, let's remember how well Exeter have done with 142s, and that the present incumbents in most FGW roles are not the same people who were at the front and making the bid that they're delivering until 2016 even if they were with the company elsewhere.

I was going to make the point about Exeter and what can be done with dedicated facilities, and their efforts have been recognised and rightly applauded elsewhere on this site.

It has gone quiet on the SPM facilities of late, IIRC it was meant to mirror the SWT arrangement at Salisbury, did this ever happen, as even recently 158's have gone to Salisbury for work, at least the fluff has stopped coming out of the carpets.  ;D

now you come to mention it the 170's were looked after to same standard as the 159's,so it must be a number of reasons.

with the odd exception swt diesels end at a depot every day.
more scope to stop units for repairs
more skilled enthusiastic workforce maybe?

also exeter have done a fantastic job on clapped out pacers lets hope once they take on the 143's the reliability of them improves,as train crew i see all the time the shortcomings of SPM far too many team leader informed,no fault found or for mobile to ride responses in defect books to faults train crew have reported.also worth noting that the good old canton trick of changing repair book is becoming more common with these now

FGW refreshed HSTs - I've said it before and I'll say it again - in my opinion bloody awful. I'm of the old school and I don't expect ttain journeys to be like Ryanair. There's more legroom on an Easyjet flight than on FGW (and Easyjet charges less per mile half the time).

And there is more legroom on a FGW Hst than a Voyager, ... but what about Ryanair is there more legroom on a ryanair plane than an Easy jet one.........quite frankly i am not interested

when you book 6 months in advance! Try going to Bristol Airport on the day you want to travel sunshine and you'll be in for a shock!

And also try taking as much luggage to the airport, that people seem to think they can take on trains and see how excess baggage works... I wish the railways would enforce this, because it really does take the mick sometimes.

that is a valid point however if every passenger had a suitcase would there be enough storage?