DB Cargo offers 10 66s for sale

[Edwin_m]

The class 73s that have been re-engined are probably enough to meet any short-term need for mid-power freight haulage.  There are so few short freights these days that except where route availability intervenes it's probably cheaper to use an overly large engine which would otherwise be sitting idle, rather than spend money on something new and non-standard. 

Edited August 6, 2017 by Edwin_m

[Mark Saunders]

As has already been pointed out upthread, the class 37s have a lower RA rating and can go to places that are barred to the 66s, while the 67s have a massively high axle loading and an RA to match. Given Railhead Treatment Trains (RHTTs) must venture onto lines that are otherwise the sole domain of EMUs / DMUs (and may be bared to freight) to clean them, replacing 37s with 66s or 67s is a non starter.

 

In previous years pairs of 20s have done RHTT duties - maybe there are fewer of them these days so more 37s are required to fill the gaps.

 

The MPV's can be used where locomotives can't.

 

Mark Saunders

[black and decker boy]

The 37s are mostly used on network rail monitoring trains operated by COLAS, not RHTT. Only the Cambrian has to have 37s (in the shape of 97/3s) and a few lines in Yorkshire that get class 20s.

 

I think most other RHTT are now covered by 57/66/67.

 

DRS has an ever decreasing pool of 37s for flask and other work. Most of their effort is in keeping the 37/4s battered into running order for the time limited LHCS workings. At the end of which in 2019, presumably they will sell or scrap the lot.

[John M Upton]

Sell most likely, those 37/4's with their ETH will be eagerly snapped up (or in a case or two snapped back up) by the preservation movement.

[EddieB]

If it is true that these locomotives have suffered breakage of engine components, then it is interesting to compare this sale of 4% of the initial series after around 20 years' service, with the comments Ed Burkhardt was making about serviceability of the class 47s at the time Wisconsin Central took over the freight business that was to become EWS. Burkhardt complained that the 47s had a low reliability and common faults such as crankcase leaks were grounding a major part of the fleet at any one time - hence the perceived need to buy tried and trusted from his native USA. The 47s had turned over a little more than 30 years at that time.

 

So why have some of the replacements had a shorter working life than the locos they replaced (let alone the 37s mentioned up thread)? Is it poor maintenance or poor build quality? Since they are based on the SD40-2 and its variants, the latter would seem hard to believe.

[jjb1970]

I suspect that Ed Burckhardt (along with others) willingly embraced the idea that BR was a terribly badly managed company limping along and relying on clapped out garbage to keep going and imagined that it'd be a relatively straightforward job to lease some new trains, bring in decent management and start running the outfit on commercial lines. When they were in the hot seat I think there must have been a horrible moment when they realised that actually the company they'd bought was already pretty lean and efficient, pretty well managed and that if the equipment wasn't perfect neither was it anything like as bad as some people still believe it to have been. Usually I'd be sympathetic but he seemed to be a bit of a gobby type happy enough to dismiss BR's efforts so c'est la vie.

[black and decker boy]

IIRC, the life span of the EMD PU was around 10 years before needing a full rebuild. It caused some hilarity at EWS as they bought them on a15 year lease.

 

I guess few will know whether these locos received such a PU rebuild or if EWS/DB have just done the minimum (or less perhaps) to keep them in service.

 

They ran the 60s into the ground by keep extending the engine hours limits plus broke many by using the wrong lubricating oil by all accounts.

[russ p]

The MPV's can be used where locomotives can't.

 

Mark Saunders

They keep saying the original ones are to be withdrawn but unfortunately never seems to happen!

[jjb1970]

I remember when Rail magazine were in their love in period with Ed Burckhardt and swallowing any old rubbish spoonfed to them by EWS and wrote articles telling their readers how the Class 66 was going to be so much better than all other trains and the pinnacle of all things. To anybody familiar with corporate speak large parts of the articles were very clearly just directly copied from PR handouts. A bit like when the same magazine climbed on a high horse to print invidious articles about nefarious EU emissions regs that would make it impossible to build new diesel trains for the UK. Yes, impossible until somebody decided to build some.

[brack]

15 year leases on new motive power was pretty much standard us practice until power by the hour. I imagine that ews just followed standard WC/US policy.

I think the us engine overhaul timings are roughly 7-10 years or 750000 miles. So a loco coming up to the end of its 15 year lease is just coming up to its second heavy overhaul.

[keefer]

Weren't the 66s kind of hamstrung from the start though (compared, say, to their closest relative the 59s)? In that they were built down to a price (inc. poor engine & cab isolation/insulation and no cab a/c) and maintained to a price (were not maintained to EMD's more rigorous spec, but to a spec that was thought 'adequate')?

I should say that this only my understanding of what has been said in the past on RMWeb.

Edited August 6, 2017 by keefer

[rob D2]

I suspect that Ed Burckhardt (along with others) willingly embraced the idea that BR was a terribly badly managed company limping along and relying on clapped out garbage to keep going and imagined that it'd be a relatively straightforward job to lease some new trains, bring in decent management and start running the outfit on commercial lines. When they were in the hot seat I think there must have been a horrible moment when they realised that actually the company they'd bought was already pretty lean and efficient, pretty well managed and that if the equipment wasn't perfect neither was it anything like as bad as some people still believe it to have been. Usually I'd be sympathetic but he seemed to be a bit of a gobby type happy enough to dismiss BR's efforts so c'est la vie.

 

Errr, yeah....RFD was making a terrible loss and the 47s were achieving dire availability.EWS wanted something with availability in the 90s % which they got with the 66... and non of the indigenous types got close.

 

They are getting rid of these 66s , it would seem purely because they have engine faults and with over supply at present they don't need them .

 

Did you used to work for the Iraqi publicity office ?

[jjb1970]

I’d work for anybody if they paid me enough, never let moral scruples get in the way of profit is what I say.

 

Apologies, I never realised that the EWS asset base inherited from BR consisted of clapped out RFD 47’s.

 

On privatisation it was clear that there would be a requirement for major investment, the nature of an industry like rail means there is almost always a need for major investment regardless of how good assets are. What is often forgotten is that BR had made heavy investment in its asset base and despite claims that it handed over a pile of junk it handed over a mixed fleet of equipment varying from the excellent to the stuff that clearly needed replacement. At the time of privatisation the initial generation of new entrants appear to have really believed that all that was needed was a good bit of private enterprise cost cutting and marketing and a few new shiny bits and everything would be tip top compared to the monolithic wreck that was BR. That ignored the fact that in its last decade of life at least BR was a very efficient, customer focused railway which had received quite a lot of investment and seen something of a renaissance.

 

I’ve always lived on the WCML, I remember the bearded saints endless carping about all those decades where BR invested nothing, he inherited a disaster etc. I always thought it was a good job that the Class 90’s, Mk.3 DVTs, the Mk.3 coach fleet, the effort to convert buffet cars to modular configuration, new ticket machines etc etc had never happened and were all a figment of the collective imagination.

 

In terms of freight, clearly streamlining the big three into a single entity made sense (well to me anyway) and there is always improvement that can be made in any business (if it believes otherwise then that in itself is something needing attention). That however is very different from the ideas peddled by certain people at the time of privatisation to the effect that BR = bad and that EWS = marvellous.

[great central]

Errr, yeah....RFD was making a terrible loss and the 47s were achieving dire availability.EWS wanted something with availability in the 90s % which they got with the 66... and non of the indigenous types got close.

 

They are getting rid of these 66s , it would seem purely because they have engine faults and with over supply at present they don't need them .

 

Did you used to work for the Iraqi publicity office ?

I seem to recall reading somewhere about different ways of quoting availability figures.

I may be wrong on this so apologies to anyone first if I am but BR quoted availability figures across an entire fleet whether the loco was on an exam or stood down for other reasons.

The EWS way was to take anything on exams or otherwise stood down and place it into 'store' therefore only quoting a figure for locos actually ready for traffic

[newbryford]

I seem to recall reading somewhere about different ways of quoting availability figures.

I may be wrong on this so apologies to anyone first if I am but BR quoted availability figures across an entire fleet whether the loco was on an exam or stood down for other reasons.

The EWS way was to take anything on exams or otherwise stood down and place it into 'store' therefore only quoting a figure for locos actually ready for traffic

 

IIRC, the Class 59 availability was based on  booked jobs worked. So had a resultant very high figure.

 

Cheers,

Mick

[rob D2]

I’d work for anybody if they paid me enough, never let moral scruples get in the way of profit is what I say.Apologies, I never realised that the EWS asset base inherited from BR consisted of clapped out RFD 47’s.On privatisation it was clear that there would be a requirement for major investment, the nature of an industry like rail means there is almost always a need for major investment regardless of how good assets are. What is often forgotten is that BR had made heavy investment in its asset base and despite claims that it handed over a pile of junk it handed over a mixed fleet of equipment varying from the excellent to the stuff that clearly needed replacement. At the time of privatisation the initial generation of new entrants appear to have really believed that all that was needed was a good bit of private enterprise cost cutting and marketing and a few new shiny bits and everything would be tip top compared to the monolithic wreck that was BR. That ignored the fact that in its last decade of life at least BR was a very efficient, customer focused railway which had received quite a lot of investment and seen something of a renaissance.I’ve always lived on the WCML, I remember the bearded saints endless carping about all those decades where BR invested nothing, he inherited a disaster etc. I always thought it was a good job that the Class 90’s, Mk.3 DVTs, the Mk.3 coach fleet, the effort to convert buffet cars to modular configuration, new ticket machines etc etc had never happened and were all a figment of the collective imagination.In terms of freight, clearly streamlining the big three into a single entity made sense (well to me anyway) and there is always improvement that can be made in any business (if it believes otherwise then that in itself is something needing attention). That however is very different from the ideas peddled by certain people at the time of privatisation to the effect that BR = bad and that EWS = marvellous.

Well that may have been the case on passenger side, but the aim was for each 66 to replace 3 locos , which they did and it was goodbye to the 31s,33s, and freight 47s.

 

The plan IIRc was to retain the heavyweight 37s, 56s, 58s and 60s. Time tells us that didn't quite pan out.

 

The thing with the three shadowy franchises was that they would never get sold to three competing companies - a tiny slice of a tiny slice wasn't worth bidding for to then have to compete for the tiny slice with others...er...not gonna work.

[Zomboid]

The thing with the three shadowy franchises was that they would never get sold to three competing companies - a tiny slice of a tiny slice wasn't worth bidding for to then have to compete for the tiny slice with others...er...not gonna work.

Though as it turns out rail freight seems quite competitive with several serious players of varying size, all taking work from each other. And the one which seems to be struggling most is the largest...

[31A]

The whole thing seems to be an echo of Edwardian times when several British railway companies couldn't build or buy enough locos at home and turned to American loco builders; the American locos only lasted a fraction of the time of equivalent British ones!

[AberdeenBill]

A "cracked engine block" doesn't sound very healthy...      Does this arise from a catastrophic failure or is it the inevitable result of old age/wear and tear?    Have other 66s with similar problems been repaired?

 

Thanks,

Bill

[ColinK]

Perhaps a Welsh scrapyard will buy them, don't cut them up and hope preservation groups buy them in 20 years time.

[melmerby]

Cummins supplied the engines for the 15X series to BR and they are an American company, not sure how much was UK supplied but at the time there was a factory at Darlington!

 

Mark Saunders

Cummins still supply engines to the UK transport market especially buses but also rail vehicles.

AFAIK Mostly US manufactured these days.

 

Keith

[jjb1970]

Blocks don't just crack through wear and tear or old age on engines of that size (well, not unless they're a lot older than any of the Class 66's). Usually on larger engines the block will last the life of the engine (liners, piston crowns etc are another story) and you'd usually expect the engine to last for the life of the asset it powers. There are several mechanisms that can lead to a cracked block but it is normally thermal stress from not properly controlling thermal expansion/contraction. You can repair cracked blocks depending on where the crack is and size, direction etc, although it's not always worth making a repair even where it can be done. EMD were famous as a pioneer of making extensive use of welding in place of casting for their engines going back to the 1930's. That was one of the technologies they were genuine pioneers in.

Under the NRM regulation (and equivalent regulations) there are provisions to cover scenarios like that as you are allowed to replace engines with identical replacement engines under controlled circumstances even if it doesn't meet the current emissions requirements.

[jjb1970]

One of the differences between marine and rail engines is that the marine versions tend to be heavier as class rules require a stronger crankshaft than those supplied with power generation and rail variants of the same basic engine along with certain requirements for materials and system modelling. That makes a big difference to the price of the engine. Class societies get a lot of demands to accept the non-marine versions for marine use based on the manufacturer having built 1000's of the things and service experience. When asked for failure data the requests always seemed to go quiet.The marine variants also need to be SOLAS compliant for fire safety which adds a lot to the cost. Again certain engine builders are always complaining about that, claiming that it is safety gone mad.

[DRS Crewe On A Mission]

Just my personal opinion here and I have know credible knowledge as to if this is accurate or not.

 

Maybe these ten 66s are been offered for sale solely because of cracked engine blocks which sounds like a significant failure which cannot be repaired easily. Also alongside this fact considering that DB have lost some contracts and from what I know some drivers have or are to lose their jobs, these further two reasons probably support and validate the initial reason behind selling them.

[G-BOAF]

surprised to see 66250 on the list - the youngest of the EWS 66s, and therefore presumably free of corrosion and other issues that impacted early builds. Also, along with 66001, a candidate for eventual preservation (as the ‘last of the first')?