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Class 110 at Liverpool street


NS Peak
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With time on my hands I was browsing and came across this 

 

British Rail  Class 110 DMU Liverpool Street

 

The comments on the picture don’t shed any light on what on earth is a class 110 doing at Liverpool Street station. It looks like it  might be coupled to a railfreight 31 and  It must be sometime after mid 1986 as the station has NSE branding.  Does anyone know what it was doing there?

 

thanks Stephen

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Two 2-car sets were converted to Sandite units in 1988 and renumbered in the departmental 977xxx series. They retained their normal b/g livery, some cars even still had their 'Metrotrain' logos.

I wonder if this is one of the sets? Although it still doesn't explain why it's so far from Neville Hill depot.

 

https://railcar.co.uk/type/class-110/non-passenger-use

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1 hour ago, NS Peak said:

A sandite unit could be it, also might explain being coupled to a class 31.  Photo does look lik3 a hot summers day however and not sure if it’s the season for sandite.

 

 

 

The sanding units were still self propelled though,  I remember going to Hull with one

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8 hours ago, NS Peak said:

With time on my hands I was browsing and came across this 

 

British Rail  Class 110 DMU Liverpool Street

 

The comments on the picture don’t shed any light on what on earth is a class 110 doing at Liverpool Street station. It looks like it  might be coupled to a railfreight 31 and  It must be sometime after mid 1986 as the station has NSE branding.  Does anyone know what it was doing there?

 

thanks Stephen

That is such an interesting photo.

 

I don't have an answer, but keefer's suggestion of the Sandite usage is possible.  Could it be that the DMU had failed whilst on Sandite, hence Class 31 drag? 

 

Whatever, it is still well off territory.  I was out and about most days on GE metals in the mid to late 1980's but I never remember seeing a 110;  though having said that the excellent Railcar site has an image of a 110 in Stratford Thornton Fields CS https://railcar.co.uk/images/13408 but that is not the set in your photo as it depicts a 3 car set.

 

 

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4 hours ago, Dave47549 said:

51834+52072 were reported on passenger workings from Cambridge from late May '87, pic link below is from June:

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/73789322@N04/40681550540/

 

Rail Enthusiast #73 lists it working the 15:50 Cambridge - Ipswich (paired with a 101) & 17:55 return on 27 June.

110s occasionally ventured as far as Cambridge on passenger workings from Doncaster via Lincoln, Sleaford, Peterborough, as shown at 3:01 in this excellent video from Roy Harrison:  (as an aside this is the first time I saw classes 110 and 105 working in multiple).

 

I suspect the very unusual working of a 110 on Cambridge - Ipswich was an emergency replacement for the usual 101 or 105. 

 

The benefits of a proper integrated railway system where, RA and driver knowledge permitting, anything could be used anywhere. 

 

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19 hours ago, keefer said:

Two 2-car sets were converted to Sandite units in 1988 and renumbered in the departmental 977xxx series. They retained their normal b/g livery, some cars even still had their 'Metrotrain' logos.

I wonder if this is one of the sets? Although it still doesn't explain why it's so far from Neville Hill depot.

 

https://railcar.co.uk/type/class-110/non-passenger-use


I don’t know if this is what you say as the dates don’t tally. Liverpool Street was well into its redevelopment by 1988 and the photo shows the old station as you can still see what was the BTP police station in the white looking building in the distance.

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This was before my time in in the RCE, but I think they occasionality used 110s as inspection sets across the Eastern region, either as the earlier dedicated ones where indisposed or withdrawn due to asbestos. This may be a urban myth but 110's had 1st class seating in both ends and the inspection staff were partial to having comfy seats in both directions; they also had more grunt. I assume that it was 31 hauled since you would not want a DMU slowing up the south end of the GEML.

 

By the time I was in RCE Anglia we had regular visits from the track recording unit instead (Class 150/1 look alike), this had the benefit of recording defects and marking them. I had had a trip from Norwich to Lowestoft and the alarms never stopped for more than about half a mile at a time. More to do with the bouncy broads than constant twist faults.

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Can’t find my photos of the 110s in the repair shop at Stratford to post, but I have found a photo of 2 class 110 DMBCs in the repair shop on page 110 (aptly!!) of British Rail DMUs and diesel rail cars by Brian Morrison.

 

Photo is dated 22 September 1987.

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1 hour ago, Zomboid said:

Wouldn't the 31 slow down the DMU?:jester:

 

Class 31's were only under powered if you think they are Type 3's. A Class 110 power twin has 720hp a 31/1 has 1470hp - vital to keep up between the units.

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A class 110 twin has 11.25bhp/ton, a class 110/31 combo has about 12.8bhp/ton. Not enough to make a noticeable difference let alone make it worthwhile, especially as it will still be limited to 70mph anyway.

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52 minutes ago, Titan said:

A class 110 twin has 11.25bhp/ton, a class 110/31 combo has about 12.8bhp/ton. Not enough to make a noticeable difference let alone make it worthwhile, especially as it will still be limited to 70mph anyway.

 

The critical thing for the south end of the GEML is ability to accelerate between signal checks, top speed is almost irrelevant and bhp/ton is less of an issue then torque. I am not a Mech Eng but as far as I am aware a traction motor will have much better torque profile than a mechanical transmission. Having been behind a 31 on short ballast workings they can shift.

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I think you probably mean tractive effort, rather than torque, but it sort-of amounts to the same thing.

 

Mechanical transmissions and electrical transmissions can have all sorts of different TE/Speed characteristics, according to what they are designed for, but even pre-power-electronic electrical transmissions often have a smoother deliver of TE as they accelerate, because a mechanical transmission takes a lot longer to go through a gear-change step than any slight interruption of TE during notching of an electric transmission. Some first generation DMMUs had really slow gear changes, and the loss of acceleration at each was utterly painful.

 

I have no point of reference with a Class 110, because I've not knowingly ridden on one, and know nothing about the drive-train, but I do know that Class 31 with even a half-decent load of coaches behind it had a very leaden acceleration when compared with either suburban or main-line EMUs if the 1950/60s kind. The only thing that seemed more leaden was a Class 40.

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26 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

I have no point of reference with a Class 110, because I've not knowingly ridden on one, and know nothing about the drive-train, but I do know that Class 31 with even a half-decent load of coaches behind it had a very leaden acceleration when compared with either suburban or main-line EMUs if the 1950/60s kind. The only thing that seemed more leaden was a Class 40.

 

While there were differences in how ETH was taken off the engine between early and late  31/4  conversions a four or five coach set of coaches with ETH operating would take out between 15-33% of the available hp. The loco hauling the 110 was a 31/1 - while not as spritely as a 37 it was probably deemed sufficient.

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I remember working a 31 with a semi-fast out of KX one evening, just as the first 313s were introduced. We were stops at FP, Potters Bar, Welwyn etc.

 

The 313 left FP the same time as us, done all stops to PB and we got there seconds before he did! 

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I think the picture probably is either the summer  1986 or 1987.  What sets the boundary is. 
 

1). Introduction of NSE in the summer of 86

2) redevelopment of Liverpool Street station made the station look very different from late 87 onwards

3) speed of application of NSE livery 

4) the uniforms the staff 

5) Liverpool Street can be very very cold and dark and there are few days a year where staff would be walking around in short sleeves 

 

I am also curious on why 110 units would go all the way to Stratford when I would have thought Neville Hill would have been able to deal with most repairs 

 

 

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On 13/03/2021 at 12:51, NS Peak said:

With time on my hands I was browsing and came across this 

 

British Rail  Class 110 DMU Liverpool Street

 

The comments on the picture don’t shed any light on what on earth is a class 110 doing at Liverpool Street station. It looks like it  might be coupled to a railfreight 31 and  It must be sometime after mid 1986 as the station has NSE branding.  Does anyone know what it was doing there?

 

thanks Stephen

 

Apparently it’s on its way to half way between Darlington and Doncaster!  Not for the faint hearted!!  It was bad enough when a 104 turned up on a Sunday Chelmsford to Liverpool St service.

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