Eurostar scrapping class 373s

[Purley Oaks]

Dava is right - with the notorious amount of train failures on VTEC, couldn't they have a unit or two on stand-by until the Azumas arrive?

Mal

Edited September 21, 2016 by Purley Oaks

[Titan]

I think the obsolete electronics is a red herring. For a fleet like that you would just get emulators made that would just plug in to the same slots, do the same job, only using modern available components which would probably take up 1/4 of the room and cost 1/10 of the  price of the original components allowing for inflation.

 

I am pretty sure that there are parallels in the classic car world too, many 1980's cars with fuel injection etc. are becoming collectible, and you can get plug in replacement ECU's which look the same on the outside, but have modern electronics inside.

[stewartingram]

Makes me feel old to see these scrapped.

 

Stewart

[Fat Controller]

Iirc part of it is also how running under the Thames has affected them.

?

[Fat Controller]

Would it be possible to take the coaches and use them as hauled sets? Apart from the length of these trains, they have fitted on the SR region of BR for years, and you could always just run half a set modified for use with a 67 or such?

You really wouldn't want to. With only one door per side on each vehicle, dwell times are appalling; the Disney train gets about ten minutes at Ashford for loading and unloading.

[Ian J.]

I imagine that the condition of the basic chassis and bodywork will also be a factor. If they're in a bit of a state, then there's no point in refurbishing them as they'll be giving trouble for years to come despite the money spent on them. If, however, the basics are in a good state, then it seems mad to not re-use the vehicles with refurbishment. But, c'est la vie.

[Dunsignalling]

With respect to the OP, the scrapping is not news - although the reminder is useful!

 

I think discussion on potential for re-use on HS2 has been held here before and those with far better knowledge of the subject then me have rejected it as a non-starter…probably on the grounds of age/cost etc.

 

For the TGV SE original sets - and using Wikipedia data - even if 40 are still in use, it is perhaps worth noting that a considerably greater number has been scrapped.

And France has so many High Speed routes that some must, by now, be regarded as less prestigious than others.

 

Older units can be used to increase off-peak service frequencies on these where the cost of additional new ones might not be justified.

 

John

Edited September 21, 2016 by Dunsignalling

[hayfield]

last year for the first time for 10+ years I went again on Eurostar, the quality even against the train from Watford to Euston let alone the TGV's we travelled on was disappointing. This year we travelled Eurostar again, thankfully on new trains, what a difference. OK seemed a bit more cramped but so much better. It was the Italian trains we travelled on that were the worst (even were in a compartment train into Milan on the return journey), no doubt as there seem to be plenty of newer trains on the network I guess these will soon be upgraded.

 

Whilst in someways its better to recycle/upcycle I guess it comes to a situation its cheaper to build new rather than convert. I was told last year that Eurostar trains were going to be totally refitted though !!

[D854_Tiger]

The pace of technological change nowadays is so much faster.

 

Then it's not just the railways, the next variants of the Boeing Dreamliner will be capable of flying non-stop from London to Sydney, should any airline choose to do so, and all with just two engines.

 

With composite aircraft like that flying around it makes it every difficult to justify keeping a twenty year old long range design like Airbus A340 in service, with its four engines, no matter how much life it has left in it.

 

Some of these new aircraft are game changers.

 

I remember one of my old college lecturers claiming the rate of technological change was like a barrel rolling down a hill and the barrel was still at the top, only just starting.

 

Even so, no matter how much technology comes and then goes, the 64 thousand dollar question is how come we still have Pacers knocking around.

[298]

The pace of technological change nowadays is so much faster.

 

Then it's not just the railways, the next variants of the Boeing Dreamliner will be capable of flying non-stop from London to Sydney, should any airline choose to do so, and all with just two engines.

 

With composite aircraft like that flying around it makes it every difficult to justify keeping a twenty year old long range design like Airbus A340 in service, with its four engines, no matter how much life it has left in it.

 

Some of these new aircraft are game changers.

 

 

Not always, the maintenance costs for an A380 increase dramatically once the airframe gets to over 50,000 hours, and Singapore Airlines have recently announced they won't be renewing the lease on their early A380s which were delivered in 2007, despite having new ones on order.

 

I think what is generally needed is a basic shell of a train carriage that won't rot, but could undergo a complete mid-life refit instead of having to be replaced outright, New technologies could be incorporated but the basic loading gauge isn't going to change, and it ticks the political box as the train refitting factories could be built within the UK, unlike most new bodyshells that are built wholly abroad. Perhaps that was the idea with Mk4 stock being built with the thought of tilt being retro fitted, even if that idea was never followed through.

[PaulCheffus]

It was the Italian trains we travelled on that were the worst (even were in a compartment train into Milan on the return journey), no doubt as there seem to be plenty of newer trains on the network I guess these will soon be upgraded.

 

Hi

 

Was that between Milan and Ventimiglia? We had reserved seats which were in a compartment on that route via Genoa and the compartment coaches were locked so we lost our seat reservations.

 

However we found the rest of the Italian trains to be excellent especially the ones operated by Italo.

 

Cheers

 

Paul

Edited September 21, 2016 by PaulCheffus

[25901]

If you want to go on about waste of money regarding Eurostar don't forget the Nightstar stock, the converted 37s and the gen coaches

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/68751857@N05/27884155416

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/54202855@N08/5251632760

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/58806173@N08/7896467208

[hayfield]

Hi

 

Was that between Milan and Ventimiglia? We had reserved seats which were in a compartment on that route via Genoa and the compartment coaches were locked so we lost our seat reservations.

 

However we found the rest of the Italian trains to be excellent especially the ones operated by Italo.

 

Cheers

 

Paul

 

 

Paul

 

We got on at Chiavari which is a bit before Genoa, a week ago Saturday (10 days). Train kept good time (was 5 mins late and made up time after Genoa) and when possible had a turn of speed, but well old

[brushman47544]

It was the Italian trains we travelled on that were the worst (even were in a compartment train into Milan on the return journey), no doubt as there seem to be plenty of newer trains on the network I guess these will soon be upgraded.

 

We got on at Chiavari which is a bit before Genoa, a week ago Saturday (10 days). Train kept good time (was 5 mins late and made up time after Genoa) and when possible had a turn of speed, but well old

 

The IC trains between Ventimiglia and Milan are mostly formed of UIC Z/Z1 coaches which as you say have not been refurbished and still include compartment stock. Indeed of the loco hauled trains operated by Trenitalia, the current IC stock is by and large the poor relation. The regional sector carriages operated with E.464 single cab locos is well into a refurbishment programme that includes new windows and the fitment of air conditioning and the UIC-Z1 and Gran Confort carriages used in the Frecciabianca trains (with E.402B locos or E.414 power cars) have also been heavily refurbished.

 

However, many of these Frecciabianca carriages are now being cascaded back to IC services following the introduction of the Frecciarossa 1000 sets and they and further refurbished UIC-Z1 stock will soonbe used on traditional IC services, in push-pull mode with "new" single cab E.401 locos converted from E.402A (info in Italian here http://www.ferrovie.it/portale/leggi.php?id=1872). At least in Italy there are still loco hauled long distance trains, it's not all units.

[Arun Sharma]

298 said, "I think what is generally needed is a basic shell of a train carriage that won't rot, but could undergo a complete mid-life refit instead of having to be replaced outright, New technologies could be incorporated but the basic loading gauge isn't going to change, and it ticks the political box as the train refitting factories could be built within the UK, unlike most new bodyshells that are built wholly abroad. Perhaps that was the idea with Mk4 stock being built with the thought of tilt being retro fitted, even if that idea was never followed through". 

 

This is exactly what London Transport and TfL have been doing with their underground stocks for decades. Indeed the class 240 [ex-D78 District Line stock] are now on their third incarnation. No reason at all why the ROSCO's can't do it with mainline stock - other than the obvious which is the knock on effect on the companies that are building and designing new stock which fewer TOCs would need leading to a further decline in UK industry..... 

 

In general, the Treasury would prefer that companies spent money rather than saved it!

Edited September 21, 2016 by ted675

[sanspareil]

If they are so old/outdated and so on why are E* refub'ing any of them? Surely keeping just some and making the fleet so small fleet will only make them more expensive/non-standard to operate and so on? How many will they retain, has it ever been confirmed?

 

I can see it coming..... 'remaining 373's to be scrapped just a short time after full refurb'! Give it say 3 years?

 

I can understand many of the reasons for them being scrapped and not being taken on by another operator, but still its a shame nonetheless to see them start to fade away and does seem a waste.

 

Enjoyed many a good journey on them (when I have got a seat with a window!) and when not the buffet car with its high level windows is something a bit different/special. I think they still look pretty good (better than the E320) and sound petty distinctive when passing at full speed. The E320 like most new gen stock just seems to lack character. I also had the joy of being featured on the BBC after taking a photo at Leeds station of a GNER 373 and being promptly stopped by platform staff - running down the platform and waving his hands in front of my camera for fear that I might be a terrorist. Ah the memories are all flooding back!

[Coryton]

 Perhaps that was the idea with Mk4 stock being built with the thought of tilt being retro fitted, even if that idea was never followed through.

 

I've never been sure if the intention was ever to retro-fit existing Mk4 carriages, or just that the Mk4 was designed to a tilt profile so that a tilting variant could be built for the WCML without having to change the bodyshell (the latter seems more plausible, and it's easy to see how that could have resulted in people thinking the former was true).

[jjb1970]

Re-engineering is nothing new and BR and the successor ROSCOs have been quite active in through life upgrades of existing rolling stock. A good example is the new Hitachi traction package fitted to some of the Networker units.

[jjb1970]

The IC trains between Ventimiglia and Milan are mostly formed of UIC Z/Z1 coaches which as you say have not been refurbished and still include compartment stock. Indeed of the loco hauled trains operated by Trenitalia, the current IC stock is by and large the poor relation. The regional sector carriages operated with E.464 single cab locos is well into a refurbishment programme that includes new windows and the fitment of air conditioning and the UIC-Z1 and Gran Confort carriages used in the Frecciabianca trains (with E.402B locos or E.414 power cars) have also been heavily refurbished.

 

However, many of these Frecciabianca carriages are now being cascaded back to IC services following the introduction of the Frecciarossa 1000 sets and they and further refurbished UIC-Z1 stock will soonbe used on traditional IC services, in push-pull mode with "new" single cab E.401 locos converted from E.402A (info in Italian here http://www.ferrovie.it/portale/leggi.php?id=1872). At least in Italy there are still loco hauled long distance trains, it's not all units.

I like Italian trains. I wouldn’t describe it as the most efficient or best railway system in the world but I do find it a very pleasant system to use. They have some very attractive looking trains and still use a lot of locomotive hauled trains. They have hundreds of E464 locomotives operating push-pull services and do still have plenty of locomotive hauled longer distance services. Very modeller friendly too in terms of available RTR models, with companies like ACME, ViTrains, Rivarossi, Lima, OS.Kar, Roco and LE Models offering a very wide range of excellent models. And despite the accepted truism on prices and the high cost of HO many of these models are competitive on price with modern UK OO. Well worth a look for anybody wanting to model something slightly different for which there are plenty of items available.

[irishmail]

So, will there be a class 373 preservation group?  .............

[BernardTPM]

I can remember as a teenager in the early 1970s being surprised to hear that Hymeks were being withdrawn and scrapped even though some were barely 10 years old, so 22 years isn't too bad an innings by comparison. Funny, it seems a long time ago when I made the power car masters for the Eurotunnel exhibition layouts, which must have been around the time they came out. Those models replaced the repainted TGVs they originally had (possibly with vac-formed power car shells?). They in turn were replaced with the Kato version when that arrived a few years later.

[HillsideDepot]

The "scrap train" is due off St Pancras International from platform 5, and out of interest I had a little look at the platform occupation at St P.

Working backwards: 

 

6X73 - 2340 St Pancras International to Kingsbury Sdgs is its final run.

 

0Z73 1910 Peterboro Maint Shed Gbrf to St Pancras International is the previous arrival at platform 5, is which is presumably a GBRf class 66 to haul it away north

 

9I61 1952 Bruxelles Midi to St Pancras International is the Eurostar arriving in platform 5, in service.

 

So straight from service to the scrap yard, by the look of it!

[olivegreen]

So, will there be a class 373 preservation group?  .............

 

Good grief, I hope not. Whatever for?

[sanspareil]

You would assume there would be significant component recovery from the set for E* for the remaining fleet, maybe at the scrapyard or maybe not? Straight from service to scrap yard does sound a little surprising.

 

I think even the NRM 373 is missing a few bits 'under the bonnet' when i had a nose around?

[Tim H]

I would have expected the set to run ECS to the depot for formal decomissioning rather than head straight to the scrapyard from its last revenue-earning run. Is there any precedent for something like this?