Great Western Coffee Shop

Railway Eye blog post link.
http://railwayeye.blogspot.com/2008/08/train-u-like.html

Yes, well that would be down to appalling Adelante reliability again.

Only 180104 appeared to be fit today, as it was on the 05.42 London to Worcester etc turn, with the HST put on the 7.10 from Oxford instead of 2x180s, before presumably eventually going off on the 15.33 extra to Plymouth.

If FGW are keeping the 180s for another eight months or so, could they at least try to look after them properly? I assumed they had got 104 and 105 back from store at Oxley because 108 and 109 were proving too problematic, but it seems to have made no difference.

The 180/HST swap on the 05.42 diagram has happened at least twice this week that I know about and at least three times last week. I have a feeling it's going to carry on this way until it really is Adios Adelantes out of Paddington.

It will indeed, though summer weather has never been to their liking!

It's harder to keep three units available for two diagrams than it was to keep fourteen units for ten diagrams (or however many it was). Routine maintenance and spare parts are all made harder to properly control.

Ahhh, That extra Plymouth explains why I saw an HST come thru Newton Abbot ECS last night

Does anyone know what the problem is with these?  They are Cummins diesel/Voith transmission just like 14X/15X/175 and so on.  Those don't seem to break frequently.  And from personal experience, a two car Pacer with only one engine running can still manage to operate a complete journey (Cardiff Central to Merthyr & back).  I would have thought that a 180 could stagger back to base even on two engines.

Probably unrelated to motive power.

Adelante MPC is around 5000
FGW 142 MPC is around 7500

Computery stuff mainly. Oh, and that they enjoy catching fire as a hobby.

Minimum of 50% power required. Also not all engines have compressors, so no air, no go. And 2 engines cannot do the electrics in all 5 coaches.

Its also really nice to have a (link below)