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Journey by Journey / Cross Country services / Re: CrossCountry HST divided at Lawrence Hill. 31st October 2016
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on: November 01, 2016, 10:21:25
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A very unusual occurrence. I wonder if the RAIB▸ will be informed.
Unusual, or unprecedented? There was the potential for disaster, even if the outcome was mere inconvenience, so I suppose the RAIB will need to be told. If no-one knows whether they should be told or not, I would imagine the default position is to give them a call. I understand as soon as the brake lines separated it would apply emergency brakes throughout. Lucky nobody in that vestibule at the split, but guess that's unlikely between a power car and coach.
Reports elsewhere the lead carriage was recently back from its C4 work/exam.
Lucky nobody in that vestibule at the split, but guess that's unlikely between a power car and coach.
On XC▸ sets there is public access to the vestibules at both ends. At the standard class end there is the bike store while at the first class end you have the usual sliding door leading out to the vestibule. It is slightly different on GWR▸ sets. The TM‡'s office is at the standard class end, but you can access the vestibule at the first class end - and there is a toilet there too. If the brakes suddenly came on and you are in the vestibule, you could be thrown forward - doesn't bear thinking about. It's unusual...this is not the first time this has happened to a HST▸ (or other T&RS) albeit with altered circumstances.  No potential for disaster...as correctly stated - as soon as the brake pipe hoses are parted the brakes will apply - that is the design.  There are locked inward opening gangway end doors so nobody is getting 'thrown' out of the vestibule Hollywod style.  The RAIB will always be informed & they will advise what actions they require ie. Move nothing/Recover but quarantine/No further action required etc.  Cant comment further on the rest but you only have to look at the conditon of the bogies and coupler on the coaches in the picture and the powercar to start to work things out.  |
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Journey by Journey / Bristol (WECA) Commuters / Re: Person struck by a train, near Nailsea & Backwell Station - 9 August 2014
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on: August 11, 2014, 11:57:09
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Apologies for causing any undue distress!? I dont think there was any unneccessary level of detail atall.
Person hit by a train always implies to me that 'the nasty train has hit an innocent person who was going about their business' & almost all of the time this is not the case!
I also felt it neccessary to highlight that despite the incident, many 'customers' clearly aren't that distressed by it all as they could simply not resist the urge to rubberneck. The rest couldn't really give a dam - the 'obstruction on the line' is a terrible inconveniance that is going to make them late.
Fortunately because of the location of this incident, no public bystanders were present but as with previous instances, such as the Slough example & a more recent fatality at Parsons Street, some people were unfortunte enough to witness the incident and no amount of media sensoring will ever benefit them.
One positive from this however, is a technique that I will use in future for dealing with kids who ask questions when stuck on an involved train - the mother cleverly convinced them that the train had a flat tyre and it was being fixed. When they finally started moving again, the kids were heard to celebrate that the tyre had been changed & the train was moving again - Ahh, the innocence of childhood.
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All across the Great Western territory / Across the West / Re: Train Cleanliness and Regular Delays (Specific Trains)
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on: November 24, 2012, 17:20:02
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All of the mess on your videos is caused by the dirty, animal like people who seem to travel on the west fleet.
As someone who has to work in it, both on the West fleet units and the HSS▸ , some of the things you find when you open toilet doors is vile and i cannot understand how any civilised human being could create such 'mess'.
Feceses piled up above the height of the toilet pan, used tampons/sanitary towels, aswell as the 'usual' obvious piles of vomit and other bodily fluids on weekend services - it gets to a point where you wonder why it is worth fitting nice new taps/basins/pans and tolilet seats (as they were when refreshed) if they are just going to be vandalised and abused.
Doing pick-ups, emptying bins and changing bin bags and replenishing consumables such as hand soap, hand towels and toilet roll is perfectly achievable on depot or in traffic, but no staff, on-board or depot based should not be expected have to deal with the daily disgusting state that the PASSENGERS leave the trains and in particular the toilets in....
I spend most of my working day under frame of units/HSTs▸ , working in residual human waste that is dropped out of the toilet pipes, but you could not pay me enough to handle some of the things that minimum wage MITE contractors do on a nightly basis.
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All across the Great Western territory / The Wider Picture - related rail and other transport issues / Re: Two girls killed on level crossing at Elsenham (December 2005)
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on: January 31, 2012, 19:06:41
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Stop, look, listen, live.
This was a basic principal that was taught to me by my parents as well as in school - If they had followed this, they would still be alive.
The parents/idiots are just using NR» as a scapegoat and are completely ignoring that fact that their children were dippy enough to ignore the warnings and run infront of a train.
What about the harm done to the driver who watched them disappear under his unit, or the poor bystanders on the platform who had to endure being covered in the girls 'red mist'....
Schools are probably too busy teaching kids about Global warming and human rights to bother about things like basic road/railway safety and 'not talking to strangers'.
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All across the Great Western territory / Across the West / Re: Class 150/1 Revenue Protection
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on: August 19, 2011, 14:20:48
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i think we have been here with the pacers several times on the forum, shame its such a pain to swap them around as a 4 car set made up of a 150/2 between a split 150/1 would fix that, mind you would that mean rewiring like on 153999
Almost certainly :-) I know that 999 has a non-standard, goodness knows how many way jumper cable fitted between coaches and that is probably just the start of it. In addition to the lack of available stock precluding such an arrangement, I wouldn't think that depots would want to give up the flexibility provided by easily coupled/uncoupled 2 car sets. Now that the 150/1 series is being fitted with intermediate door key panels, they are as easy to work for a guard as the 150/2s. In some ways, they are better, drop light in the vestibule and bigger cabs for example. The problem arises when these sets run in multiple. No matter how guards are instructed to work, there will always be scope for fare avoidance and/or anti social behaviour in such cases. There is no technical reason why a 150/1 could be split in half and a 150/2 set placed betewen the vehicles. All of the units have an 'emergency' 42-way jumper recepticle on the cab end (Drivers side), that the 42-way jumper on the non cab-end would simply plug into making an electrcially coupled formation. The only issue preventing it happening today would be that the majority of FGW▸ 150/2s have had this front 42-way disconnected as they have been the cause of electrcial faults in the past caused by water ingress due to never being used and being exposed to harsh conditions, but these are easily replaceable & reconnectable with a day spent on depot. We had to do eaxactly the same process to the 158s when they were made 3-car units. That is the beauty of DMUs▸ , they can just keep being banged together as long as they are all working ok. The same applies for 153999, which is a hybrid formation of a 153 and half of 150221 that was unaffected by the fire it suffered at Plymouth. The 150/2 vehicle is simply coupled to the 153 and then the 42-way jumper plugged into the 'emergency' recepticle on the cab front. As the 153 fleet belongs to Exeter, i am not sure if the 153s have had their 42-way receptices disconnected aswell, but it may have been replaced before the vehicles were joined, or the 153 specifically choosen as the 42-way was still connected & working. The only downside to running multiple unit formations around in this fashion is thagt there is only one 42-way jumper between semi-permaently coupled vehicles, insteasd of the usual two (one per side), so 50% redundancy is instantly lost in the event of damge to the jumper, however 158/3s carry an extra-long emergency jumper which allows the opposite recepticle to be used in the event of a fault, although this is rare. 153999 may have a similiar arrangment. Personally i would split a few of our 150/2s and place single cars in between the 150/1s, making 3-car suburban/short distance units with extra capacity but without loosing too much flexibility. This has been done sucessfully by LM▸ for 10 years plus. |
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All across the Great Western territory / Across the West / Re: Class 150/1 Revenue Protection
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on: August 19, 2011, 13:54:10
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For my part I was guilty of an over-simplification in my OP▸ . The following is a moderately technical explanation which goes part way towards explaining the rule.
Firstly, the physical barrier presented by non-gangwayed stock means that some local authorities prefer a guard in the trailing set to cope with any unforeseen circumstances. As such, there will be a train crew member in each portion of the train. I should however emphasise that current safety features are tried and proven and that the positioning of guards is an 'extra layer' as it were.
For example, unit doors are so wired that brake release cannot be obtained until all are shut. (TIS‡ or Traction Interlock Switch). Similarly, should a door open in traffic, the train will be brought to a halt. This can be bypassed when dealing with faults that would otherwise incapacitate a train. When the TIS is isolated, brake release can be obtained without doors being closed and doors can open in traffic without the train being halted. In such cases, the guard will need to make sure that all doors are held closed by air pressure following every stop. The driver would do this in leading unit and the guard in the trailing portion.
In another scenario:-
In normal circumstances, an electrical circuit, (Train Wire) runs around the train, passing through the various train brake circuits and the handles in each cab. The Train Wire draws power from the rearmost battery in the trailing vehicle. Break the circuit, (perhaps by division of the train) and brakes are activated throughout ALL portions of the train. (Activation of the Passcomm also breaks the circuit so stopping the train). So far so good.
However, there are very rare fault-based occurrences which permit drivers to isolate this system. Rules state that pax must be evacuated from rear unit if practicable, (difficult, dangerous and not a viable option with non gangwayed stock when not platformed). The guard must then ride in the leading cab of the trailing unit to apply the handbrake, should the train divide, as the train wire has in effect, been 'switched off.' Thus, all remotely controlled brake handles, (normally 'live' for emergency brake application), are rendered inoperative, excepting that in the cab from which the train is being driven.
Obviously in above circumstances, the train would be taken out of service at the first practicable location.
I totally empathise with Inspector Blakey's viewpoint ref interconnected units though and cannot offer a better explanation. I can only surmise that a guard in the rear unit is viewed as a means of maximising the benefits of an already considerable safety system.
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Almost there, but you are using the wrong termonology and wrong operating princicapals. The train wires, of which there are 42 on DMUs▸ , are resonsible for through-control in a multiple-unit formation, wether there are two vehicles or ten. The train wires (TWs) are passed between vehicles via the autocoupler contact boxes as found on the driving or cab ends of DMU vehicles, or by 42-way jumpers and recepticles, as found on the intermeidiate or non-driving ends of DMU vehicles. Each trainwire is invidually numbered and has a singal use, except the lights on/off TWs, which are also used to transmitting PA▸ signals, and several are spare or nt=ot used. As you correctly state, the logic of the trainwires is that the rear vehcile of an electrcially joined multiple-unit formation provides the feeds through the trainwires. Now lets adress the errors! The TIS (traction interlock switch) is a normally sealed switch that enables the Traction Interlock circuit on the vehicle in question to be overridden, allowing traction power to be obtained despite the loss of interlock either through a fault or a door not being able to be shut properly. Traction Interlock is TW36 and passes through only two relays per vehicle which make/break the trainwire depending on the state of the inerlock on that individual vehicle. Brake release is determined by TW4 'Brake Continuity', which relies on several crucial interlocks, including suffcient air pressure to control brakes (Main Resovoir Governor), correct coupling of both of the vehicles autocouplers (through a microswitchs operated by the movment of the coupling pin and a couple-proving relay), Drivers brake controller (if the brake controller in any cab in a unit formation is put into Emergancy, brake continuity is broken) and a couple of other switches and relays. The electrcial systems interconnecting with the trainwires are often very complex and practifcally fail-safe, for example, Operating a Passcom for example does not directly break TW4, but instead breaks a circuit that deenergises a relay called PER (Passenger Emergancy Relay) that then brakes TW4 and thus removess brake continuity and gives an emergancy brake application. Like the TIS for the traction circuit, there is also an override availiable for the brake continuity circuit, called an EBS▸ (Emergacny Bypass Switch). This is a get out of jail switch that can be operated in the event of a fault conditon or TW4 fault that prevents brake release. Operating this flag switch in the driving cab, removes the main function of the trainwire, and renders the brake controllers in other cabs, the Passscoms and the coupling interlocks redundant, but still retains the MRG (Main Resovoir Govorner) protection so that the brakes cannot be released if there is not suffceint air pressure to re-apply them. I must emphasis that the EBS is what its name states, an emergancy last resort and as the OP correctly stated, there are specific conditions in which the EBS and also the TIS can be operated on a mainline service train and strict procedures that must be followed by the traincrew while the EBS/TIS is operated, such as sagain the OP has given examples of. Hope this expliand things a litte bit and i have not chucked too much technical stuff in. |
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All across the Great Western territory / Across the West / Re: MTU Power Cars
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on: August 01, 2011, 21:36:48
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Almost right, the fans are not 'blocked', the radiators in the cooler group that the fan draws air through is blocked/restricted giving restricted airflow and thus degraded cooling ability causing HWTs (High Water Temperatures). As a temporary measure to the problem, the fan controller is being overridden meaning that instead of running at a variable speed depending on the temperature, the fan runs at full speed constantly.
The fan by the way, is hydraulically powered from a shaft off of the 'free' end of the engine with its operation being via an electronic controller that interfaces with the MTU▸ engine 'MDEC' ECU.
The power cars will be stopped for repair, which will consist of either steam cleaning of the radiator panels, or a change of cooler group, which will then hopefully put a stop to the HWT issues it is having!
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All across the Great Western territory / Across the West / Re: Stock cascade of class 150s
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on: August 01, 2011, 21:01:49
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150126 is staying, it has spent the last week plus at SPM▸ being given a 'conversion exam' to get it in sync with the FGW▸ exam schedules, and has being given all mods etc. to bring it into line with the other FGW 150/1s.
150108 is also staying and will receive the same treatment as 126, along with the rest of the 150/1s we are due to recieve which should start arriving in small batches next month.
AFAIK▸ , the two LM▸ 153s are tempry and should be going back to LM when they are surplus.
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...only half of the stair structures still standing when I passed today @ approx 1630. Couldnt take a photo as up the front & had lost the light on the way back.
