Great Western Coffee Shop

166208 visited Barnstaple around one O'clock this morning - said to be on gauge clearance run and first visit of a turbo to Barnstaple.  When I last heard, plan was to run 3 car 158s on the Barnstaple line - has that changed for some  / all workings, or is this just a precautionary clearance?

How do members feel about 166 (and presumably 165) Turbos on the Barnstaple services?  What about Exmouth and Paignton?

Do these have 1st class which would not be needed. Paignton-Exmouth need the 4 coach 2x150/2 unless they are to replace the pacers.

First class avaiiability seems to depend on whim!

If experience on the North Downs is anything to go by, units with 1st class will be used on all standard class services, so the savvy regular traveler will go to any part of the train with first class seats, ignore any antimacassars (there's no consistency between when they are installed and when first class is actually offered) and have a better wider seat at no extra cost. Some 2 car 165s no longer have ex-1st class seats (and I believe all have been officially downgraded to standard only, even if they do), and 166s have first class seats at both cab ends, one of which is now standard.

Hope that helps!

Could be for diagraming flexablity, ie GWR would be able to deploy their fleet more effectively

I don't think I've seen anything labelled as "First Class" on any of the turbo trains working out from St Phillips' Marsh and suspect that any being transferred with those facilities are being degraded.  Timetables don't (to my knowledge) show any SPM based turn workings with first class either, though there are a lot of announcements telling you which zone to wait in for first class just before they pull in.  (Zone 5 for standard class and zone 6 for first class)

I would be very surprised to see anything in Devon run with a 165/166 and offering first class beyond the left-over extra bit of space from Thames Valley days.  I would certainly not expect to see turbos on Devon services offering in first class what you'll routinely find out of Euston and Kings Cross with tickets including (as I understand it) full food service at seat at certain times of day.

They would be rather less unsuitable for Exeter-Barnstaple than for Cardiff-Portsmouth in my view. Whether they would actually be suitable for Barnstaple services versus, say, class 150/2s might depend on passenger loading versus train length. In other words, is a 3-car class 166 (ideally with all 2+3 seating removed and replaced with 2+2) sufficient for passenger numbers or do you need to run units in mutiple in which case something with unit-end gangways would be better.

No turbos on the Barney please. We’ve been promised air-conditioning and that’s what we expect.

Sorry to disappoint but the air con on the 158’s isn’t anything to get excited about.

...and if you get a 165 with retro-fitted air cooling it works well - when it works. It does seem though entirely random whether air-cooling is fitted when the partial refitting (it's too little to justify "refurbishment" as a label) occurs

Most of the 165s have now had air cooling fitted. It works almost all of the time the windows are kept shut.  166s still have air-con from 5-10 years ago.  It works about 50% of the time when windows are shut.

I had the pleasure of a 165 recently with working (and finally effective) air-con. It looks like vents have been fitted either side of the saloon lighting and the cooling unit fitted above the seats by the doors.

Indeed - so I now habitually glance up when I get on to see if I've struck lucky!

I think II that at least one of the 166s has been refitted with the system now being installed on the 165s, as I have been on one working the North Downs line that seemed to have the same type of ventilators on the ceiling, and a better supply of cool air, too.

One thing though still has not been addressed is reliability. Just as with 166s, air-cooled 165s seem often to run with air cooling not running in one of the coaches

I believe it was just route clearance to allow the use of turbos in the future.

It is however still planned to have 3 car 158s running the Barny line from the 15th December unless anything has changed that I am unaware of...