The Official Rapido APT-E Thread

[Colin_McLeod]

Who said it has to be under its own power? APT-E Drag sounds good to me, get the proto HST to do it...

 

i'll grab my coat...

Or use Stirling No1

[srihaggis]

Or use Stirling No1

 

Get those turbines singing if thats the other alternative

[Budgie]

Although I can see why purposefully sitting in one of the airline seats next to a pillar seems rather odd I do understand why people try to sit in airline seats. On many rail enthusiast boards there is an assumption that the world wants facing seating bays but I think there is a large/significant part of the market which wants airline seating. I must admit I prefer airline seats as I find they generally offer more leg room (unless you're lucky and nobody sits in the seat opposite) and I find it more comfortable. But that's just a personal preference.

So when I went to Warley a couple of years ago, I sat at a table in a facing seating bay in first class (with an old git's railcard, I hasten to add), and I was watching something on my tablet. I remember looking up from the screen and out of the window as we were running alongside the canal. Imagine my surprise when the canal appeared to be above my head, and it took me ages to persuade my brain to accept the reality of the situation.

 

So maybe people sit next to a pillar to avoid the feeling of being in an unfamiliar position when occasionally looking out of the window when reading etc.

Edited February 1, 2016 by Budgie

[loickebros]

So when I went to Warley a couple of years ago, I sat at a table in a facing seating bay in first class (with an old git's railcard, I hasten to add), and I was watching something on my tablet. I remember looking up from the screen and out of the window as we were running alongside the canal. Imagine my surprise when the canal appeared to be above my head, and it took me ages to persuade my brain to accept the reality of the situation.

 

So maybe people sit next to a pillar to avoid the feeling of being in an unfamiliar position when occasionally looking out of the window when reading etc.

Oh no!

I seem to be lost again i was looking for info on an APT-E model i pre ordered.

I think i will now go and visit the "bargain hunters" thread to see what tangent that has gone on today.

[Mr_Tilt]

Don't know if this has been asked anywhere else on this forum; but can anyone tell me what prevents the APT-E actually running under power again ? We have seen the HST prototype come to life again (albeit with a replacement power unit); it would be great to see this piece of history running on a preserved line too.

 

Two reasons at least 1) Lack of money and 2) Lack of expertise in particular areas.

 

The APT-E Support and Conservation Group have very few funds, and no real means of getting much more. There are so few of us that we don't have people to look after the finances or administration, we just DO things on the train.

 

While we have in-house expertise on the tilt system (me.......) and instrumentation (Malc Wilson and Barrie May) and a little access to some on the brakes (Martin Collins) we don't have any on the turbines or the traction motors etc. We do have two zero hour turbines, currently not installed aboard the train, but no-one who knows how commission them or anything else. As someone's already mentioned above, the Leyland turbines are not exactly common, they only built maybe 50 of them at the maximum and we only know of 13 currently in existence, 10 on the train, our two spares and one in a Leyland Turbine truck in Cambridgeshire.

 

Even assuming we could overcome all that we have to re-connect the train's four vehicles in the correct order and the right way round, currently the two Trailer Cars are swapped over and the wrong way round, and then re-connect all the zillions of cables that run from vehicle to vehicle through the steering beams which were sawn through when the train was moved from York to Shildon in 2004, and for which we have no drawings.

 

Apart from all that it'd be pretty simple I guess.... 

[BernardTPM]

Several films of the GT lorry in action here.

[BR60103]

I think I have found some pictures of APT-E testing from before the body shells were ready.

 

Is Kit in there somewhere?

[Mr_Tilt]

I think I have found some pictures of APT-E testing from before the body shells were ready.

Tilt_5875.jpg

Tilt_5874.jpg

Tilt_5872.jpg

 

Is Kit in there somewhere?

 

Not blooming likely! 

 

My employers post my time at BR used to build some of the higher tech theme park rides, amongst other very techie things, and I know the loads that go into some of those structures. No way am I going on any of them!

 

Looking at the pics that's a heck of a cant angle on those tracks, it's close to 45 deg, so the 'train' must be REALLY moving to make that work.

[ColinK]

It is a great shame that we don't have the funds and ability to bring APT-E back to life. In my opinion, it is one of the most important trains in the development of the modern railway - just as important (maybe more) as Mallard, Flying Scotsman etc. It is APT that pioneered the way for the modern high speed tilting train throughout the world.

 

If anyone from the NRM is reading this, hope there will be an exhibition showing the development of the modern train, with APT as its centrepiece.

 

The downside of highlighting APT is that it shows the folly of this country, abandon something new just before its 100% right, leaving other countries to finish it off and reap the benefits.

[jjb1970]

The ETR.401 (the first production Pendolino train) entered service in the mid 70's and the Italian work on tilting goes back to the 1960's I think so it is not correct to consider that Britain developed tilting trains only to hand the concept over to other countries. Tilting trains were quite a happening area in that era, the Bombardier LRC was also intended to tilt.

[Wolf27]

It is a great shame that we don't have the funds and ability to bring APT-E back to life. In my opinion, it is one of the most important trains in the development of the modern railway - just as important (maybe more) as Mallard, Flying Scotsman etc. It is APT that pioneered the way for the modern high speed tilting train throughout the world.

If anyone from the NRM is reading this, hope there will be an exhibition showing the development of the modern train, with APT as its centrepiece.

The downside of highlighting APT is that it shows the folly of this country, abandon something new just before its 100% right, leaving other countries to finish it off and reap the benefits.

Just be thankful that the APT-E survives to this day, along with HSFV1 and Hastings. The real travesty was the scrapping of the POP train in 1985. That was the first item of British tilting rolling stock.

 

Cheers

 

Shane

[Pete the Elaner]

The ETR.401 (the first production Pendolino train) entered service in the mid 70's and the Italian work on tilting goes back to the 1960's I think so it is not correct to consider that Britain developed tilting trains only to hand the concept over to other countries. Tilting trains were quite a happening area in that era, the Bombardier LRC was also intended to tilt.

That's not quite what I read.

ETR 401 was an experimental development, much like the E-train & it first ran in 1976, 4 years after the E-train.

The first service train the E450 was introduced in 1988. If the APT project had been seen through, it would probably have been in service before then.

 

I know its only wikipedia, but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FS_Class_ETR_450

 

So it appears the Italian tilting train was later than the British one but not by enough to be a complete re-package.

[jjb1970]

Interesting, I always thought the 401 had entered service. Either way I think tilting trains were developing in several countries alongside the APT and any lead the APT had was slim. I think as well the ETR.401 was more representative of subsequent trains than the relationship between the APT-E and APT-P.

[Titan]

That's not quite what I read.

ETR 401 was an experimental development, much like the E-train & it first ran in 1976, 4 years after the E-train.

The first service train the E450 was introduced in 1988. If the APT project had been seen through, it would probably have been in service before then.

 

I know its only wikipedia, but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FS_Class_ETR_450

 

So it appears the Italian tilting train was later than the British one but not by enough to be a complete re-package.

 

The APT was in service in 1981, 7 years before the E450. The HST was done from scratch including prototype testing and in to service in less than that.  Just how long is long enough? 

[Pete the Elaner]

7 years is not much when you are developing new technology such as tilting & a new method of braking. The HST was not really done from scratch, it was an evolution of proven technology.

The APT project started in the 1960s.

[Mr_Tilt]

FIAT were working on the ET401 at the same time as we were building POP-Train, but the POP-Train tilt system was STREETS ahead of anything that had been done before, no matter when it was designed and built.

 

Other tilt systems tended to either work like pendulums, as the Talgo trains do, or were relatively low powered. The APT system was designed to be the highest performance tilt system ever built, and it was. The designed tilt rate was 9 deg./sec and the fastest we managed, with PC4 on POP-Train with a well tuned Mk 2 tilt pack, was a shade under 12 deg./sec. Nothing anywhere else ever came close and probably never will do because the requirement isn't there any more as modern systems don't need to compensate fully.

 

The LRC train tilt system came well after APT, if only because the main man on that part of the Canadian project was Trevor Easton who worked in Tilt Development with me before he went to Canada in the mid '70s.

 

The fact that APT tilted is not the most important thing about the design. That was the wheel/rail interface, the work on the basic wheel profiles that was carried out by Prof. Alan Wickens in the late 60s and developed to a mature, well defined product on the APT. BR made that information freely available to any and all railways worldwide, and NO-ONE had ever done that work before.

 

The whole railway world owes Alan a big thank you for his work, but very few people know of that fundamental work that he did.

 

But you all do now............ 

Edited February 5, 2016 by Mr_Tilt

[Colin_McLeod]

Kit that was very interesting. If you ever write your autobiography can I please have a signed copy?

Edited February 5, 2016 by Colin_McLeod

[Mr_Tilt]

Kit that was very interesting. If you ever write your autobiography can I please have a signed copy?

 

Hehehe, you're not the first person whose suggested that, but I suspect it'd have a pretty limited market. 

[Danim]

I'd buy it wonder if one could be included in the apt-e box

 

Hint hint

Edited February 6, 2016 by Danim

[BR60103]

Not blooming likely! 

 

My employers post my time at BR used to build some of the higher tech theme park rides, amongst other very techie things, and I know the loads that go into some of those structures. No way am I going on any of them!

 

Looking at the pics that's a heck of a cant angle on those tracks, it's close to 45 deg, so the 'train' must be REALLY moving to make that work.

This is the new Seven Dwarves Mine Ride at Disney World. My wife was horrified every time I suggested I might go on it. (I don't really like roller coasters.)

The train seemed to come to a dead stop on a straight level section just after the curve in the first photo.

[No Decorum]

Hehehe, you're not the first person whose suggested that, but I suspect it'd have a pretty limited market. 

Isn’t that what PDFs are for? Not to mention that Kindle thiing. Anyhow, we’ve been promised a book with the model.

[Mr_Tilt]

 

This is the new Seven Dwarves Mine Ride at Disney World. My wife was horrified every time I suggested I might go on it. (I don't really like roller coasters.)

The train seemed to come to a dead stop on a straight level section just after the curve in the first photo.

 

It's even got a tilt system! 

 

The passenger carrying bits seem to have a longitudinal pivot mounted on the chassis bits so that the passenger bit pendulums in or out on the curves, depending how fast it's going. The pivot is quite high though,it looks to be about chest height, whereas for humans to feel comfortable sitting down it should be at hip height.

 

Pretty clever though. 

 

I'd buy it wonder if one could be included in the apt-e box

Hint hint

 

There IS a book on the E-Train in the model box. I wrote the historical bit of it, before the train went to York, and Paul Leadley has written the preservation bit of it. Although I say it myself, it's pretty darn good for a short form book on the E-Train.

 

It'd take me for EVER to write my own life story, not to mention the time it would take being passed by lawyers and stuff to make sure I hadn't libelled someone!

 

Isn’t that what PDFs are for? Not to mention that Kindle thiing. Anyhow, we’ve been promised a book with the model.

 

See above concerning the contents of the model's book. It's about the train, not me, thank goodness.

[No Decorum]

What I meant was that one book in the package would be as much or more as anyone could expect. I am looking forward to it. Nevertheless, I would still be interested in an autobiography. Here’s something to start you off. “I was born…”

 

You could always chicken out and get someone to write an engineering biography – a subtitle I remember being used for a book about a CME.

[shreds]

Don't publishers have "ghost" writers who can translate your words into a volume!

 

I would order a copy. Now!

[Ian J.]

I don't think an autobiography can really be ghost written - it becomes a biography

 

One of the principal arts in a good biography is knowing the person, and for someone who's alive and is willing to authorize the biography then it becomes a case of the writer having the social skills to ask the right questions of the person to get the information flowing (with or without lubrication ). That, and having a tape/digital recorder with a long recording time...

Edited February 6, 2016 by Ian J.