Great Western Coffee Shop

I spotted these two babies stabled on the old Bath Road spur 11/03/2008 (let me know someone please if this photo has come out.TA)

There was no photo in your post unfortunately, 12hoursunday.

Were they these ones?

There was when I clicked the link.
Hopefully these two can be put in to service as soon as possible.

Could I ask you to put up the link so its more obvious? When I checked out 12hoursunday's post, there didnt appear to be anything there.

That's why I quoted miniman's post (including his photo) from yesterday in reply.

Many thanks.

It's hiding at the bottom of the post. Easy though when you spot it!

You tell me how to do it and I will quite happiely do it. I used that Additional Options thingy below then clicked that attach button. I am sorry to say that I'm no computer buff and my daughter is getting fed up having to keep instructing me in what to do when using this and other internet sites. >:(

There are detailed instructions from the 'Help' menu at the top. The stuff related to posting is here (http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?action=help;page=post).

 :oONE OF THE SETS WAS WORKING THE 16.40 FROM PENZANCE, HAD AN RPI DOING THE TICKETS MUST BE ON BONUS!

Just a polite request, less of the caps please  ;)

Arriva liveried 150229 worked the 0730 Bristol/Penzance and worked back on the 1508 Penzance/Bristol in tandom with London Overground 150121,153369 was then added to the formation at Exeter.

And a went on to Cheltenham...

london overground? i think you mean silverlink county well actually it is fgw now just waiting on refresh once all the others are done.

No technically is a London Overground unit on short term lease to FGW. The route it operated on with Silverlink County is now operated by London Overground.

Would explain why we had a FGW unit last night for the 22:30 service from Cardiff Central to Portsmouth Harbour. Any idea why we had to have it replaced at all guys?

I don't understand your question, but if it was a refurbished 158 which is in FGW livery you are quite lucky as they are very nice inside.

Sorry that I wasn't clear, I meant that the 158 was replaced with a 150 refurbed by FGW. Was just curious why that was, and even more so as another 150 unrefurbed replaced a 158 this morning.

Simple, 158's are being refurbed super quickly meaning more are out at a time so more are replaced with 150's which are uncomfrotable for long journeys which is bad in short term but will be good come May when Portsmout-Cardiff will be operated by 3-car refurbished 158's.

when we recieved em they were from silverlink as it was just pror to london overground because fgw wanted all silverlink branding removed.
150121&127 are not on short term lease they are on long term to fgw now and as such are going to be refreshed like the rest of the fleet.
the only units on short term are 142's and atw 150's.

Not so. The units were returned to the leasing company by TfL. This was because the London Midland franchise declined to hire two units from TfL for Bedford - Bletchey services. 121 and 127 became surplus.

This all happened after the end of Silverlink.
 
Incidentally the units were debranded by Silverlink as part of their (end of) franchise agreement. In the same way that all the Wessex units were debranded  in late Mar 2006.

the units were actually de branded by st philips marsh because i saw it being done,management insisted it was done before they went out in service.

150121 &127 transferred here when silverlink/ct got split up,so we got them when london midland and overground were formed.

http://www.railwayscene.co.uk/showthread.php?thread=3307

not wishing to get in a slanging match but this is how it happened.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news but 127 was debranded BEFORE it came to us, a photo of it in London http://richard-armstrong.fotopic.net/p46761624.html . All units had to be handed to the new franchisee completely debranded.

Indeed no slanging match required.

But.....

Debranding on our two units is identical to that done at Willesden on the TfL fleet. As per the phtotgraph put up by another poster Silverlink stickered over their bird logo in purple vynil. Dont know what you saw at the Marsh.


I agree we got these two units in your words "when silverlink/ct got split up"  But refining that statement:
 Silverlink handed over the assets and the new operators -TfL got the 150 fleet.
 TfL did not need these units for their services, LM did not need to sub-lease them prefering to use 153's.

TfL  declared them surplus. I understand TfL still hold the master lease on these units FGW actually sub lease them on a long lease.

The RailwayScene thread you quote does not contradict what I have stated. It does speculate on what might be happening.

point taken about the exterior branding.

what i saw being done was all the posters and alike inside were being debranded,staff from the marsh were using marker pens and power car blue paint to cover anything silverlink so i just assumed the exterior was done by them also.
management insisted on it prior to entering service you would think they would have more important things to worry about.
i was told they are not sub leased but fgw actually hold the lease and as such are having the fgw refresh once the rest of fleet is done,and then all the lm sets we get will also have the same treatment.
i suppose given time we will see what happens

Indeed.

Leasing is a very complicated subject which I don't pretend to know everything about. But we've got these units for the long haul, which is no bad thing as they are better than most of what we already have.

I am looking forward to when the 10 LM stes get here

i think we are having more than 10 sets

i heard about 40 carriages plus 2 permanent 3 cars?
wait and see what turns up next year i reckon

Do you think First will even stick a logo vinyl on the ATW 150's? Surely they confuse people who aren't aware of them?

Really ? As many as that??

I had heard a rumour that 150 001 and 002  (the 3 car sets) were coming. But another 17 units (assuming the above are included in the 40 figure) would mean we could shake out those wretched 142's.

Bring it on.....

But as you say best to wait and see what actually turns up on the Marsh.

my understanding is the 142's are on a shortish lease 5 going back this year and i believe the rest are due to go back when we get lm's 150's.
and yes i have also heard 001 and 002 are coming.

suits me if it happens the 150's from lm are better than ours in my opinion (not better looking than refreshed sets but better reliability)

I saw with my own eyes at about half 6 today at Portsmouth Harbour a 3 coach 158 refurbed sat waiting to leave, such a wonderful sight at last!

That would be 158950 http://southwest-railways.50webs.com/158950.htm

how many ATW units have been transferred to FGW? I notice a lot of the ATW routes that used to use 150s now use 143's e.g. swanline. Ive even seen some 175's on the swanline service and they are usually reserved for long distance routes e.g Carmarthen to Manchester.

Also it was weird in Cardiff today with no services to Portsmouth Hbr and Taunton running due to engineering work, and the Manchester service terminating at Newport. 

At one point the screen on Platform 2 had no trains due to arrive/depart at all with most of them departing from Platform 1!

We have five Arriva 150's.  ;D

Thanks.

No worries, there fab as we now get 3car 158's!