phil-b259

I suspect all doors are locked while on the move to prevent undesirables from trying to gain access should the train come to an unscheduled halt for any reason

Yes and no. Although it showed the under frames being very strong the passenger accommodation was pretty mangled… The same is obvious when you look at photos of the Clapham crash in 1987…

Google maps is updated frequently at no cost to reflect changes (and I’m not just talking about new roads) to the road network - when was the last time your car manufacturer supplied a free update? Also google maps can show live traffic information and can warn you of delays ahead plus offer you alternative routes - can your built in car system do that? Car manufacturers have a history of being slow to update the latest trends into their vehicles - plus deliberately make it hard / expensive to update things like Sat-Nav’s…

You are rather forgetting that the Mk1 coach is actually a pretty easy thing to keep going indefinitely! This is because of the separate non load bearing body and strong underframe setup - It’s technically possible to build an brand new underframe and transfer an existing body onto it in a way that you simply cannot do with Mk2s or later due to their monocoque construction. The ORRs concerns have their origins in fact that IF the underframe do not stay in line with each other during a derailment and one rises up and impacts the relatively flimsy body then the damage to the passenger 6 will be far more extensive than with a monocoque design. The relevant regulations were also largely written at the time when their were large fleets of 3rd rail EMUs being used and the chances of two Mk1 based trains colliding was considerably higher than is the case today - something the ORR themselves acknowledge in their continued granting of exemptions to such stock

The rating of a device relates to its maximum power output! Just because a electric heater may kick out 4W doesn’t mean it has to do that! Given power is a function of Volts multiplied by current the simplest way is to add resistance into the circuit - this will (depending on the configuration used) reduce the voltage or the current being supplied to the heater and consequently reduce the power consumed to less than 4W. Similarly although a power supply may be rated at 3W - that relates to the maximum power it can provide. If the load connected is less than 3A then it will not have a problem supplying power. So if you add sufficient resistance in the circuit and your heater now only draws 2W then both your 3A power supply and 4W heater will function perfectly happily together.

Plus even ‘Idiots’ still usually have families and loved ones… Scraping human remains / body parts off the track or trains is not a pleasant task - particularly as most of the time that is not what the folk doing it signed up for when they started their employment….. Then there is the delay to other rail traffic while the incident is investigated etc….

But train paths at 25mph on the WHL are not available without totally decimating the Scotrail regular timetable! So even if WCR put forward that as their justification for not installing CDL they still wouldn’t be able to rub the Jacobite as NR would not be able to provide any suitable train paths.

Its not really the ORRs exact job to specify rolling stock (they don't go round telling any TOCs they must use X,Y or Z stock) - and their concerns around 'Mk1s' are more to do with things like metal fatigue / corosion / passenger doors / openable droplights than the Mk1 as a whole. In other words if you maintain the Mk1s to a high standard (including paying special attention to end loading pillars / couplers / buffering gear and residual underframe strength - replacing where necessary) plus deal with passenger doors / droplights then the ORR will be quite happy for them to still be used on the national rail network. Sliding doors are nothing to do with the ORR per say - but instead fall under legislation surrounding persons of reduced mobility and ensuring full accessibility for scheduled train services. Similarly the requirement for CET is not an ORR requirement (UK legislation specifically allows train operators to discharge untreated raw sewage from trains) - its a private matter for Network Rail to decide on and is in fact being driven by the trade unions who quite rightly object to their staff being forced to work / breathe in raw sewage or passengers be exposed to the same when they touch door handles or door opening buttons on the train exterior.

Given consumers (in this case railway modellers) most frequent gripe is the high prices then moving work offshore was inevitable. Assembling todays crop of highly detailed models with loads of separately fitted parts and detailed printing requires considerable dexterity and skill - you are not going to get that sort of skillset from a UK workforce on the minimum wage (which is still generally significantly higher than the average wage in china for skilled assembly work). UK produced trains would probably be coming in at the £500 -£600 plus mark if they were made in the U, not the £200 plus mark which is possible through the use of China... The same trend is true of quite a lot of consumer goods - to produce them in the UK would push the price above what consumers would be prepared to pay....

Aye - and from what I have seen the embankment looks to have a significant amount of loco ash in it (the most common type of fill used to patch up earthworks from the earliest days of rail travel right through to the end of steam. As any specialist in soil mechanics / geotechnical engineering will tell you Ash is pretty much the worst material to use to repair slips....

My Apologies, I believe there is. However the short distance between the signal and the trap point means the train wouldn't have had to be going that fast for it to still come off the rails at the trap. (It was just the leading bogie of the loco which ended up in the dirt by the way).

TPWS does not suspend the laws of physics! It takes time for the brakes on any train to apply and even longer for them to actually brig the train to a halt. As such a trap point is still an essential tool as that physically guarantees the train will be diverted away from adjacent lines if a SPAD occurs, particularly if the associated signal has no overlap (and thus no distance for the brake application to take effect) - as is usually the case with loops and sidings.

Nope. It was just a bog standard SPAD....

Yup The train SPADed the signal and the trap point did its job by derailing the loco away from the running lines. The main issue is that because the train was carrying aviation fuel tankers it was classed as carrying 'dangerous goods' and as such extra checks had to be carried out to make sure there was no damage to the wagons before adjacent lines could be re-opened.

They are however different. The bottom line is this - everything in China (including copyright law) is structured in such a way that, if it wishes to, the Chinese Communist Party (CPC) can step in and eliminate anything it sees as a threat to its grip on power. Thats why its illegal for foreign based companies to own factories or production plants - if they did then the CPC are worried that it would have no way of suppressing what it would consider 'subversive' activities, conversations or initiatives from emerging on the factory floor. Making sure a factory is under Chinese ownership allows the CPC to sack 'disloyal' workers or replace managers / owners who are not loyal to the party in ways that would be difficult to do if the factory was owned by foreign entities. Copyright laws are no different - yes they provide protection to individuals / organisations, but only as long as respecting them does not get in the way of the CPCs tight ideological control of the population. If that control is threatened then you can guarantee that copyrights will not be respected and ruled invalid in some way. Put it this way you try and copyright something which is perceived by the party to link to the Tianmian Square massacre by said CPC, however remote the link, the CPC will make sure the copyright will not be respected. In the UK by contrast copyright laws are not under political oversight and as such could be considered more robust / offer more protection as far as intellectual property goes....

You miss understand.... see the attachment. Remember that you have to consider protecting moves entering the siding from what is already in there deciding to move and colliding with it.... In general any point equipped with a point machine will need protecting with signals from ALL directions....

Correct - though the termination point for all external cables is located at the left end of the machine (which has two cable entry points side by side on the left hand end)

Don't forget that EMR are due to take delivery of a fleet of bi-mode IETs in the near future that will be able to take advantage of OLE where it exists.

Energy costs: Smart meter left woman, 87, scared to turn on heat - BBC News https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ckk77v4wvr0o Older article Smart meters: Almost three million still not working - BBC News https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-67591320

Given this https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26367160 And https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/england-met-office-worcestershire-worcester-wales-b2522182.html# I am not surprised…. And those who are trying to claim that it’s all down to inadequate maintenance need to take a reality check - yes maintenance has been neglected etc but it’s quite obvious that the volumes of rain we are getting now are a huge contributor to drainage being overwhelmed (however well the Victorians etc may have built it) and earthworks failing through saturation / liquefaction.

They suffer from extreme flange wear - if you actually bothered to do research rather than cheap point scoring you would know that British Rail found this out the hard way when the units were first introduced and the subsequent redeployment away from certain places which followed.

Or obsessed with short term returns... Never underestimate the influence of the money men and share traders.... Just look at the various privatisations - most of which have been judged as offering poor value for money over the longer term but at time of sale generated a nice tidy sum for the Government at time of sale. Porterbrook, like all private business, has to be sensitive to shareholder demands and if dividends are not felt to be high enough then long term thinking tends to go out the Window. In recent months there has been significant shareholder pressure on Unilever to dump what shareholders perceive as 'poorly performing' brands they own. (hint they are not that poorly performing, they just don't make as much profit as the other bits)

I was speaking on a general basis not about the West Highland line where Pacers are not permitted anyway.

You miss the point - thanks to increased environmental awareness scrapping things is actually pretty expensive these days as potential contaminants have to be contained and anything which cannot easily be recycled ends up being subjected to the landfill tax. Thus if you are a leasing company wanting to get rid of rolling stock then selling it on for a token amount or donating it will make the company accountants very happy. Selling it overseas (and leaving someone else to deal with disposal) is another tactic that accountants like and will have plyed a part in sending HSTs to South America.

But if the primary selling point is a ride through some pretty countryside then whether something is famous (or infectious) is irrelevant to most people. The LSL Pacers are very much a case of Hoskins wanting to play trains rather than them being ideal as the way forward while those which have entered Preservation on heritage lines is largely due to the owners selling them dirt cheap / donating them as a way of avoiding to have to pay to scrap them rather than them being ideal units for use on such lines* Pacers are also banned from some of the most scenic lines in the country - most 15X based units are not! * Restored loco hauled four wheeled coaching stock also tends to ride badly - the difference between that and a Pacer is that its (1) usually fitted with very comfortable and deeply sprung seating plus (2) its usually of the compartment format so there is no need to be stood up as it runs along.