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3286
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All across the Great Western territory / The Wider Picture in the United Kingdom / Re: New Railway Switch Developed
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on: March 20, 2019, 12:31:52
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And yes, do beware those pesky jumping pebbles.
Try this explanation: Unlike other switching solutions, locking is provided passively by the position of the rails. The actuators lift the rails out of their lock to move them. Any single actuator is capable of providing this motion and, in the event of an actuator failure, the switch is still locked in place throughout its length. Or else search for Repoint - but ignore all the stuff about the "stub switch layout", that's an entirely distinct concept that came out of the same project. I'll repeat what I said before: you could put three modular actuators one a standard sliding switch, and three lock detectors, and I suspect more than one lock too. So most of the claimed advantages are not tied to the one big new thing - passive locking. And yes, do beware those pesky jumping pebbles. |
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3288
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All across the Great Western territory / The Wider Picture in the United Kingdom / Re: New Railway Switch Developed
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on: March 18, 2019, 16:19:32
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So it avoids single point of failure by adding extra actuators, is what I gather from that video. I didn't gather how though or what lifting has to do with it (is it part of the locking mechanism?).
I think the idea is that the action of the switch rail dropping all the way down serves as a lock, and its vertical position can be used for detection. That in turn is sensed at each of the three actuators, giving triple redundancy for detection as well as actuation. However, I would have thought that you could triplicate the point motors and lock detectors, and most likely the locking mechanism too if you put your mind to it. |
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3291
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All across the Great Western territory / Across the West / Re: Great Western Main Line electrification - ongoing discussion
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on: March 17, 2019, 23:29:34
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"An indication of the additional maintenance cost of a diesel-powered fleet is given by the differing procurement costs of the Great Western and East Coast IEP▸ fleets, which include a 27-year maintenance contract. The Great Western IEP fleet costs £4 million per coach more than the electric East Coast one, mainly because it operates more miles in diesel bi-mode. Thus, the additional diesel maintenance cost of the 369-vehicle GWML▸ bi-mode fleet is around a billion pounds over the period of the maintenance contract."
(Rail Engineer May 2018)
Paying more for less?
OTC
Depends what you mean. I presume that figure of £4 million was taken from the 2014 NAO report, which gives 7.1 and 11.1 £m for the two fleets. Note that this was after the VTEC option order was added, but before the switch to all bimodes for GW▸ . The NAO report says the difference was due to: • a reduction in contract price offered by Agility for the additional East Coast fleet as a result of the Department exercising the option to procure an additional 270 carriages (see Part Five);
• lower costs of finance on East Coast due to this part of the deal reaching financial close in April 2014, when economic conditions and the Japanese yen to pound sterling exchange rates were more favourable; and
• a higher proportion of miles done by bi-mode trains in the Great Western fleet, which are more expensive to manufacture and maintain than the electric variants. Note that last point is not just that the GW bimodes were to do more miles each on diesel, but that they were then a higher fraction of the fleet so the cost of the motor/generators was higher. But really all we know is that the figure as quoted is wrong - it could be wrong in any direction. |
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3292
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All across the Great Western territory / The Wider Picture in the United Kingdom / Re: Cutting the cost of electrification
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on: March 16, 2019, 23:25:57
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The ECC report summarises the reasons for the high cost of GWEP▸ thus: The GWEP programme was over-ambitious in trying to introduce internationally novel technology – Overhead Line Equipment (OLE▸ ) and Plant – on a live project resulting in the design and development of the equipment being incomplete before construction started. Additionally, there was a non-negotiable date for the introduction of new electric trains over which industry had no control, announced before the infrastructure project had been fully scoped and costed, and which added a further major level of risk to timely and cost-efficient delivery. All this against the background of an industry that had not undertaken an electrification project the scale of GWEP for 20 years and so skills and experience needed to be rebuilt. Reading the report, what stands out is the high cost of inexperience, where the lack of confidence led to very conservative designs. The section on foundations shows how this led to very long poiles that the HOOP trains couldn't cope with: In 2012 the assumption on GWEP was that the majority of foundations would be 5m long steel piles placed using the ‘factory train’ (See Section 13). This approach was consistent with the long established ‘ORE/ OLEMI▸ ’ empirical design guidance which had been used on previous UK▸ electrification schemes. However, when detailed design was started the ORE method was not used and a ‘first principles’ limit state design approach was adopted as the loads resulting from, amongst other things, higher wire tensions were considered to beyond the evidence base which underpinned the empirical rules. Not only that but different designers were responsible for the OLE system, the masts and the foundations. These interfaces, combined with some unduly onerous design assumptions including design life, resulted in designs for piles up to 12 to 15m long. Another factor as illustrated in Figure 12 was the decision to place piles further from the track to avoid buried cables which meant a significant loss in the power the piling equipment could apply due to the increased operating radius. This also meant the cantilevers27 or portals needed to be longer increasing the loading on the pile which meant it had to be longer still. Unsurprisingly the ‘factory train’ struggled to drive such long piles and productivity was very poor. Many piles were left protruding from the ground requiring de-design and/or repositioning. This resulted in inefficient multiple visits.
All of these issues were further compounded by the immaturity of the OLE design when piling operations commenced which meant that piles, even when installed successfully, were often found to be in the wrong place when the OLE design was completed.
[..]
By 2015 it was recognised that the Great Western was not so different from previous electrification schemes and there was no justification for piles sometimes up to twice as long as previous experience for the same application28. Network Rail therefore undertook a review29 of past experience with the ORE method and commissioned research and full-size tests from the University of Southampton which demonstrated that the ORE method was adequate and therefore it had simply been unnecessary to install the very long piles which had so damaged productivity on Great Western.
That explains some of the less less detailed comments, such as the NAO's. But that kind of issue can be picked up with a quite limited amount of inputs from more experienced outsiders, which might include some of the contractors, so why did that never happen? |
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3293
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All across the Great Western territory / Across the West / Re: Great Western Main Line electrification - ongoing discussion
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on: March 16, 2019, 22:16:16
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Yes, already posted on Re: Cutting the cost of electrification, with surprisingly little reaction to its contents. This is a quote from the introduction, which certainly does belong here as it is specifically about GWEP▸ : The Great Western Electrification Programme (GWEP) was announced in 2009, and was set to cost £1bn to electrify the route to Swansea by December 2017. By the time of the Hendy Review in November 2015 the estimated cost had risen to £2.8bn for electrification to Cardiff by December 2018. In July 2017 the Government announced the cancellation of electrification between Cardiff and Swansea and on the Midland Main Line, north of Kettering. It opted instead for diesel ‘Bi-mode’ trains.
So what went wrong?
The GWEP programme was over-ambitious in trying to introduce internationally novel technology – Overhead Line Equipment (OLE▸ ) and Plant – on a live project resulting in the design and development of the equipment being incomplete before construction started. Additionally, there was a non-negotiable date for the introduction of new electric trains over which industry had no control, announced before the infrastructure project had been fully scoped and costed, and which added a further major level of risk to timely and cost-efficient delivery. All this against the background of an industry that had not undertaken an electrification project the scale of GWEP for 20 years and so skills and experience needed to be rebuilt.
To further compound the challenge, an unprecedented number of other new electrification projects were commenced at the same time, all requiring and competing for similar resources. Although, as will be discussed later, most electrification projects were delivered successfully, GWEP, which was the largest and a number of other projects ran into difficulty, and the programme and therefore budget significantly overran.
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3294
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All across the Great Western territory / Across the West / Re: Infrastructure problems in Thames Valley causing disruption elsewhere - ongoing, since Oct 2014
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on: March 15, 2019, 22:34:32
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^^
Odd that they haven’t altered it to “each year” now, which is probably far more logical and sensible...
Paul
Maybe, but is that what they meant? I read the wording to refer to 2019 up to a little before the statement date (14 March). If 90% of trains are on time, and that's 108,000 there would be 120,000 trains in that period. That's about right, but sounds a bit high to me: I can find a GWR▸ document from last year that talks about 9,000 trains per week, which is only 90,000 (ten weeks). And adding only 10,000 since 2012 doesn't look such a lot either. But then the definition of a "service" (aka a train) has a certain fuzziness to it. |
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3296
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All across the Great Western territory / The Wider Picture in the United Kingdom / Re: Cutting the cost of electrification
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on: March 14, 2019, 10:45:40
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The RIA has just released its report* resulting from the "RIA Electrification Cost Challenge". The RIA styles itself "the voice of the rail supply industry", so this report is the view of the engineering companies that made the bits and did most of the work, including some of the design. Since most of them also work for other European railways, it should provide a realistic comparison with their methods too. The RIA's summary page says: The Electrification Cost Challenge report shows how future electrification schemes can be delivered at 33-50% lower cost.The Electrification Cost Challenge (ECC) report uses examples from the UK▸ and internationally to show that the high costs seen on recent projects, including the Great Western Electrification Programme, can be avoided in the future. It suggests that significant increase in cost on some past projects like Great Western should be seen as a one-off, caused by an unrealistic programme of work, unpreparedness in using novel technologies resulting in poor productivity and a ‘feast and famine’ electrification policy. The purpose of the report is to: - Set out the benefits of electrification for passengers and customers, and how it supports the Government’s Decarbonisation Challenge;
- Summarise UK electrification strategy since 2007;
- Discuss the Great Western Electrification Project (GWEP▸ ) and the reasons that it failed;
- Highlight the lessons that have been learnt; and
- Highlight evidence that electrification can be, and is being, delivered for between 33%-50% of the costs of some recent projects using examples from around the UK and internationally.
There's a lot in this document to take in; I'll just put one short quote here (from p43): It says something about the ability of the rail industry to forget hard won experience that the ECML▸ lessons learnt included “The importance of obtaining listed building and other permissions was not appreciated at the outset”. As well as the earlier NAO report, this report also cites the initial report of the Rail Industry Decarbonisation Task Force (from RSSB▸ in January 2019). That provides the underlying justification for future electrification - it's the only way to meet the decarbonisation objectives. *No live link - I can't make it work - use the button in the web page quoted above. |
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3297
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All across the Great Western territory / Looking forward - after Coronavirus to 2045 / Re: Williams-Shapps Plan for Rail / Great British Railways
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on: March 13, 2019, 19:44:52
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Here's another hint offered by Keith Williams, this time addressing yesterday's board meeting of transport Focus. As picked up by City AM: The former British Airways chief executive tasked with a full-scale review of the railways has hinted that the industry regulator could be tasked with handling compensation claims.
Keith Williams, who was appointed by the government to carry out the review in the wake of last year's May timetable chaos, suggested the rail industry could learn from the airline industry in tasking the regulator with handling compensation claims.
Speaking at a board meeting of the independent watchdog Transport Focus, Williams said European legislation changed the way customers claimed compensation from airlines and became a benchmark for how claims were made.
"I actually do think it brought benefit in terms of the airline and in terms of ensuring that we put regularity and punctuality at the heart of what we did – if we couldn't do that, we'd be paying out compensation," he said.
Williams said the routes to claiming compensation were "not obvious" and that it needed to be "made clear". He said he has asked the rail regulator, the Office of Rail and Road (ORR» ), to look at how it thought compensation should look in the industry.
"In the airlines industry, the Civil Aviation Authority has that role," he said. "Whether we need the same in rail is a question for the review."
... I assume the headline was based on a misreading - Williams wasn't suggesting the ORR should handle claims, but that they should be responsible for how it is done. Even then, I'm not sure what he's going on about, as I don't think the CAA» has much of a role in dictating airlines' compensation systems, and not much more in telling them what they should be paying out for. Air travel claims are all fairly big, compared to rail fares, so a different system would in any case be appropriate. If he's saying that someone ( DfT» or ORR or whoever) should write one set of rules, rather than allowing TOCs▸ to make up their own passenger charters (including how the claims systems should work, i.e. how it looks to the customer) I suspect most members here would agree. |
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3299
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All across the Great Western territory / The Wider Picture Overseas / Re: Train travels 57 miles without driver
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on: March 13, 2019, 17:59:04
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Following up a piece in today's Times, I find that the ATSB published their preliminary report yesterday. The new piece of explanation that's been grabbing the reporters' interest is that the repair crew, who were meant to be working forwards along the train applying handbrakes while the driver was working his way backwards - were working on the wrong train! There's a lot in the report about the details of the braking systems on the train, which were somewhat more complicated than on your average British train. Exactly why what happened, I can't exactly fathom yet. The train-line cable parted between two cars not far from the front of the train, which caused an emergency brake application. There's a hint that this emergency brake application (120%) may have timed out, leaving the train brake set at 39%, or maybe the air bled off - that's said too. How much of the braking system operates without a continuous train-line is not clear either. There was ATP▸ that it was hoped would stop the train at the first red signal, and in any case the ATP should detect that the train is moving when the controls aren't telling it to and brake it. So, loads of factors (as usual) to try and understand. |
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3300
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Journey by Journey / London to the West / Re: Reservations
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on: March 13, 2019, 11:05:21
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If only someone could develop some some of global, let's call it, 'positioning system' that would allow a train to in a sense 'know where it is'; the reservation system would then be able to indicate whether the seats were reserved for the current stretch of the journey and remove the reservations once their endpoint was passed. I know that this is the stuff of science fiction, and any such system would no doubt be prohibitively expensive, but we can dream...
I wonder how much of the IEP▸ specification was derived from dreams? The relevant snippets say: • displays for each seat must indicate whether that seat is free, reserved for part of or for the remainder of the journey. The method of display must be easy for passengers to interpret quickly when boarding, and shall seek to convey an overall impression of the extent of reserved and unreserved seats within the saloon; and
• displays must be automatically updated throughout a journey to indicate the current reservation status for the remainder of the journey. I gather the current issues are to do with the data uploading process; the on-board software rejects a whole train's data if some parts don't match its expected format. In other words, it has so far been beyond the wit of GWR▸ and Hitachi to make this - not exactly unprecedented - process work. Or maybe it's their suppliers? I don't know who does their reservation software (if it's not in-house), but the IEP on-board system was supplied by Televic Rail. They show the project as "2013-2017", but presumably continue to support it. Televic is Belgian (at least its HQ▸ is), with a rather anonymous Rail UK▸ presence - in a rent-by-the-room Regus building at Manchester Airport. (Random thought: do such Regus offices have reservation displays outide each office or above each workstation?) |
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