Great Western Coffee Shop

In my humble opinion the 170's are the best DMU's on the network, and, if the latest RUMOUR is to believed, FGW are investigating the possibilty of having some 170's! (I know Grahame will move this thread now so i'll carry on here!) They are looking at the possibilty of sending the 180's to Scotrail to free up some 170's for us, this has come from a reasonable source so there may be some truth in it! Fingers crossed guys and gals!

I have to admit that I am a Class 170 fan as well.

This was mooted a few months ago for them to be used on the Glasgow / Edinburgh - Perth - Aberdeen / Inverness routes but rejected. Perhaps a rethink is taking / has taken place and views changed. 

Just because Im quite a fan of 158s, 170s will be MORE than welcome to these parts  :) I think Adelantes would be ideal for the IC type Scotrail services from Edinburgh/Glasgow-Aberdeen/Inverness routes as I'm sure three car 170s aren't enough capacity wise during peak times. Where as a five car 180 does bring extra seating and more of an Intercity style of service which is what it used to be like back in the days of Locos with Mk2/Mk3 stock.

It's probably a move that can be more justified (from a profit point of view for FG) for Scotland than for us, 180's and 175's I'm led to believe are virtually identical? if so then Arriva have made some mod's to the 175's which have made them one of the most reliable trains in their fleet, maybe FSR could do the same?

I take it the 170's would go straight on Portsmouth to Cardiff?

they would probably go into the 158 pool so would be used on CDF-PMH and BRI-PNZ type workings, 170's would be better than 180's as they can be workrd in multiple with all of the current FGW DMU's.

Given that all of First ScotRail's Class 170's are 3 - coach units , I would have thought they would be ideal for the Portsmouth - Cardiff route. As vacman hints , they can be coupled to Class 150 , 153 and 158 units and (according to Porterbrook) to Class 142 , 143 , 165 and 166 units as well with minor modification.

Two notes of possible caution :

1) As vacman points out , this is only a rumour , and as martyjon points out , a similiar idea has been considered and rejected before.

2) The Class 170 units could end up displacing the Class 158 units currently operating on the Portsmouth - Cardiff route. Would those 158's then end up being sent to (say) Northern Rail , rather than boosting capacity elsewhere in the FGW area?

170's can be coupled to 14x units without modification, you often see 143's coupled with 153's. I'm led to belive that this latest plan is down to Mr Haines who apparently took a trip on a 142 between Exeter and somewhere and was less than impressed! Lets hope it happens, even if it just means we get 158's from Scotland, or even 156's! Like I said, it was only a rumour, and the rumour was that FG were investigating the possibility of this move.

I will bow to your wisdom , vacman. The Porterbrook link with the "minor modification" quote can be found below.
http://www.porterbrook.co.uk/stocklib/class170-3.htm

I stand corrected! seems strange how a 170 can couple to a 158, and a 142 can couple to a 158 but a 170 can't couple to a 142? lets hope though that the 142's won't be with us that long after all though!

The 170s on the Glasgow Edinburgh run are doubled up in the peak, so potentially 1 Cl 180 could replace 2 Cl 170 if the current demand is too great for 1 unit but leaves a second under capacity. They are superb units (having travelled on them very recently) and would be a huge improvement on the existing Cl 158s, both in terms of capacity and quality of interior (though I'll admit I haven't seen the refurbed Cl 158.)

This would seem a very sensible use of stock all round.   

From what is being said above I doubt they will be if Andrew Haines has anything to do with it. He knows that by letting the 142s loose on the FGW network that it would be a PR disaster and that the press would have a field day. It would only take a camera crew to go up North showing a Wessex Trains livered 158 (they are the ones leaving FGW and not the ex-TPX sets) treading on Northern metals then showing a Northern livered 142 screeching round a bend on a devon branchline and you wouldn't need many words to make a story. 'Straight swap' would do it.

And guess who would get the blame? Give you a clue, it won't be the DfT!

If you want to see a 158 at it best travel on a SWT 158/159 which shows what you can do with them and how good they really can be; especially first class.

Give this man a medal  ;D

I've never travelled on a 170 but I have only ever heard praise for them but doubt they'll ever come down to Cornwall as they're unlikely to do BTM-PNZ as they either go to Plymouth or Exmouth afterwards but it would free up some nice 158's for us.

(http://doggedknits.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/01/isaiahyawn.jpg)



AH! Railway Rumour ;D ;D ;D

Ahh, all this talk of 150's, 170's and 180's - tosh - yawn. WHEN I'm old enough to be driving trains I'll be driving a preserved Class 101 on the TransWilts Line on hire to FGW.

Scotrails 158's are of an equal standard, all of the English taxpayers money is spent on subsidising and improving Scotlands railways!

If this happens I think we should organise a blockade at the entrance to the depot preventing them from departing for the north! I'm sick of decent trains leaving our area.

I think FGW have realised their mistakes by sending units off lease that they need! problem is, if they have more units then they need to pay for them so they need to attract more passengers which means that they will still be full!

But wouldn't that mean they'd just have to attract more people in Scotland on the heavily subsidised services which we pay for through the taxes in England anyway??  ;)

So they'll do well enough to have their franchise renewed in the middle of the next decade, then  ;D

lets hope the rumours are true.

I travlled on the FSR 170s a couple of months ago and they are very comfortable.  Three car 170s woudl certainly be better than 2 car 158s.  170s also have better accelaration and top speed (although presumably not when coupled to a 14x).  The downside is that they wear out the track faster and tehrefore attract a much higher access charge so they would cost FGW more to run. 

If we do get 170s, T'd like to see them segregated from the 14xs.  I know that the ability to couple them together makes them more flexible but it just seems stupid to me to cripple a 100mph train by coupling it to a 75mph train.  I assume that the line speed of the route is at least 90mph in many places.

You say that but remember the 0624 Arriva service from Penzance to Manchester Picc/Milford Haven? that used to be a 158+153! restricted to 75MPH!

Portsmouth - Cardiff line speed guide :

Portcreek Junction to St Denys Junction - 40 - 75 mph.
St Denys Junction to Wilton Junction - 80 - 105 mph.
Wilton Junction to Bathampton Junction - 40 - 75 mph.
Bathampton Junction to Bristol - 80 - 105 mph.
Bristol to Filton Junction - 40 - 75 mph.
Filton Junction - Severn Tunnel Junction - 80 - 105 mph.
Severn Tunnel Junction to Cardiff - either 40 - 75 mph or 80 - 105 mph depending on what line you are on.

There is also a 110 - 125 mph section from just outside Cardiff - Central station.

Wilton-Bath has a 85 section doesn'tit, in the Wyle area?

Thanks Lee, you are a mine of information.  The line speed are generally slower than I thought so a faster unit might not make a huge difference to journey times.

Not the next decade but the one after that as our young budding rail worker would only have just attained the age of double figures by the middle of the next decade.

Its not a question of doing well enough to have their franchise renewed, its who will pay the DfT the biggest premium, some would call it bribe, to run the franchise after all its the tolerant passengers that would have to contribute to the said premium
.
However, if what I read in one of the Sundays over the past weekend that petrol might top ^1-50 a litre come Christmas and ^2-50 a litre by next the young lad wont be driving a heritage DMU, he'll be firing a preserved pannier tank hauling 5 former FGW HST trailers between Westbury and Swindon on a shuttle. The trailers will of course have been modified with vacuum brakes and steam heating.

Or the pannier modified to have air brakes!, sorry, couldn't resist! ;D

Quote from Insider (link below) :
http://indefenceoffirstgreatwestern.blogspot.com/2007/11/answering-some-questions.html

"Finally to 'abp' who commented on my 'I'm Back' post, there are no plans at all for us to swap the Adelantes with Scotrail for 170 Turbostars. I'd be interetsted to know where you got that from."

:(

That was me.  :-[ :-[

Perhaps he'll suggest it now seeing as he's apparently friendly with Andrew Haines.

I wouldnt worry about it unduly , mada , nor should vacman who started the topic. Several other leads from this forum have been very close to the truth and got some interesting replies from FGW.

Personally speaking , I would encourage members to post anything that they hear , including (as vacman did) an appropriate caveat that its a rumour , if necessary.

While there *may* be no plans to 'swap' the Adelantes for class 170s, Swindon HAVE been analysing the use of 2 x 2 car class 170s on CDF to PMH, now this must be for some reason....

Have AXC painted any of their 170's in their livery yet?

No. They're just going to be in a temporary livery until they're refurbished and they're not in that yet.
(Now with the correct use of there/their and they're.)

I suppose one out of three's not bad... (http://www.takeforum.com/forum/images/smiles/tumbleweed2.gif)

Like I said in the first place it was a rumour but there was some substance behind it, the rumour started from someone who works in Swindon!

Was this directed at qprrule? I think mine was grammatically correct!

Sorry. My teachers always get at me for that. I know the use of they're but not there and their, I just always use there, don't know why, I actually have to think abot using their.

Try a little practice: www.better-english.com/easier/theyre.htm (http://www.better-english.com/easier/theyre.htm)


The correct version is They're just going to be in a temporary livery until they're refurbished and they're not in that yet.. Alternatively, you could try to construct your sentences to avoid there/their/they're altogether: The 170s will be in a temporary livery until they get refurbished, but this hasn't happened yet.

ps. About has a u in it (http://www.takeforum.com/forum/images/smiles/baeh.gif)

Don't worry: you'll know when I start picking on you! (http://www.takeforum.com/forum/images/smiles/rocketwhore.gif)

ummmmmmmmmm it's a forum not an English document!!!!!!!!!!!

Hey, just because you have low standards...(http://www.takeforum.com/forum/images/smiles/bootyshake.gif)

We seem to be heading a little off topic here guys. Lets appreciate the fact that we all type things a little differently. So as long as the message we are wanting to get across is readable then all is well. Sadly we don't hand out extra marks on this forum for spelling and punctuation...we leave that to the school teachers  ;)

THANK YOU!

It could be logically argued that the act of discussing whether or not something is on-topic may, in and of itself, be off-topic.
However, since I can't find a suitable Ouzelum bird smiley, I've decided not to! (http://www.takeforum.com/forum/images/smiles/2bounce.gif)

A completely separate thread discussing the use of English in railway announcements (verbal and written) would go down well if anyone wants to start one, I'm sure.  Correcting each other's use of the language when we're discussing whether or not 170 units may come to FGW dilutes the topic and puts other people, who may have views to express but less that purrfect English, off commenting and may make them wonder if we have anything better to do!