Ron Ron Ron

35 minutes ago, dave75 said:

Ah okay so by in phase essentially we mean the same polarity....

Yes, but the polarity switches back and forth at a very fast rate.

The phase is keeping that switching in sync at the same timing.

Last weekend at Burton Green...

(Note: no work taking place on a weekend)

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22 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

 

The rate of progress depends not only on man vs. machine but also on the geology.

Indeed.

See the link I posted further up this page, regarding the difficulties encountered with boring the Northolt West tunnels.

https://www.geplus.co.uk/news/hs2-tbm-quartet-tackles-differing-geology-on-twin-bore-tunnel-under-london-22-04-2024/

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1 hour ago, Bon Accord said:

Comparing mortgages and interest rates between now and 40 years ago really isn't illustrative.

For a start the average house price today is nine times the average salary (and rising), whereas in 1984 it was only four times.

Required deposits were significantly less and certainly back then much of the calculations were based on one wage, as opposed to today where two people can scarcely afford a mortgage.

Whilst interest rates were higher 40 years ago, today's homeowners are paying a LOT more for their property.

 

 

That's why you should treat any price, or cost  comparisons with the past, based purely on the the prevailing rates of inflation, with total suspicion .

For example the cost of a model train, a TV or a pair of shoes between say 1990 and 2024.

There are so many changing variables involved, relative cost of materials, variation in labour rates in different economies over time, different manufacturing technologies, different levels of overheads, relative costs of transportation and loads of other things.

Simply saying that inflation over that time period has been X % , has very little bearing on how or why prices have increased over the same period.

Those inflation calculators you can use, are interesting and amusing, but are far too crude to present a full picture.

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51 minutes ago, dave75 said:

 Which begs the follow up question how would power districts not be in phase? 

They would not be in phase if each individual rail in the adjacent Power District (or sub-district), on the other side of the insulated rail joiner, has been wired in the reverse.

i.e. not the same feed wire (left -right, inner-outer, red-black or whatever colour)

The track power is actually a DCC signal, which reverses rapidly in phase.

So each Power District must be in sync with each other, because otherwise, a loco bridging the gap where the two sections of rail are out of phase would cause a short.

As an analogy, think of  + &  -  with  DC.

It would be the equivalent of a loco's wheels bridging  + &  -  as it crosses the gap between each isolated section of rail.

Adding additional Boosters will be OK (if connected properly) because they should work in sync....provide the actual wiring to each rail is the right way round.

Take the same care with connecting up Circuit Breakers.

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9 hours ago, dave75 said:

Sorry poorly worded question. 

 

On the trackside , are power districts separated from each other by an insulated rail joiners on each rail ?

Each rail needs insulation from the adjacent rail in the next district, but all rails are powered and it doesn't matter if a loco bridges the gap, provided all power districts are in phase with each other.

The first use of Power Districts, was to provide adequate power to different parts of  large layouts, using separate Boosters to power each district.

In fact, the original (unofficial) definition of as "Power District", was a section of the layout, fed by it's own Booster.

With the increased use of Circuit Breakers, that definition has been watered down to also include sections protected by CB's. Those were previously described as "Sub-Districts"; i.e. sub-divisions within a single Power District.

7 hours ago, WIMorrison said:

 

Power districts can be, and often are, areas provided with power from a different source that the command station e.g. a booster. ......

 

Pedant hat on.

Sorry Iain, I can't help it !!!   🙄

A Command Station doesn't provide track power.

It's the built-in Booster that does that.

For example, the Roco Z21 box, or the Lenz LZV200 etc, etc,  contain both a Command Station and a Booster (Power Station in original Lenz and NMRA terms).

I'll take a lie down now.........

.

Mike is absolutely right about the damage the DafT and Treasury did to the franchising system, through excessive meddling and pure greed..

Franchising would have worked very well, without putting the bidding TOC's in a position where they had to bid way over the odds in order to win the contracts.

Also more fool the TOC's who ended up committing themselves to those unaffordable premium payments.

Those government departments created the environment for failure and the eventual collapse of the franchise system.

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55 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

And THAT is the REAL PROBLEM with the system of leasing trains in this country!...

 

…. Why on earth are we doing leasing deals for 5- 10 years - thus increasing the risk for the ROSCOs and therefore causing them to charge higher leasing rates!.....

 

 

 

Thats why in a sane world train leasing should either:-

 

(1) Be done by the DfT who lease the trains for 25 years at a minimum and then sub lease them back to the TOCs (thus allowing the TOCs contracts to be let for short periods of time (e.g. 5 - 10 years)

 

OR

 

(2) The DfT issues 25 year contracts to run the TOCs (and guarantee to take on the lease  should the TOC fail financially causing the TOC be run by the Government pending re-letting, at which point the new operator takes on the remainder of the lease)

 

Sorry Phil, you wasted a lot of virtual ink in that post.

It's simply not what happens.

Those lease deal are not for 5-10 years, in other words, the length of the franchise term.

There's no way that any of the trains would be deliverable on that basis.

The lease deals are underwritten by rollover terms that ensure that when the TOC is no longer the incumbent (end of franchise and new operator, takeover by OLR, Insolvency etc,), the trains (and the lease) will be passed on to the new operator.

This is where the DafT come in, because they have to underwrite the contract.

Without that, the ROSCO and the people providing the money, will not do a deal. End of !!

It's too high an exposure and risk.

Also, in your scenario (1) above, if the DafT leased the trains directly, you've introduced a new level of cost and risk.

They are already effectively doing that anyway, by taking out a long term lease indirectly .

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12 minutes ago, pete_mcfarlane said:

......I don't quite see the point of the Labour proposal. Eliminating the profit margins (which IIRC is something like 1 to 1.5%) won;'t make a massive difference to ticket prices......

Precisely.

All this talk about profits being syphoned off doesn't reflect the reality.

12 minutes ago, pete_mcfarlane said:

.....The whole proposal feels like a headline with nothing behind it. .......

Of course there's nothing behind it.

We better get used to it, there's a general Election coming.

If only there was a way of turning all the B/S into money..... 🤣

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20 hours ago, Clive martin said:

.......i am quite happy to be corrected if i am wrong but my understanding is that tax payers money goes into the purchase of new stock only for these new vehicles to be handed over to the leasing companys to make a profit ......

That's not what happens.

No public money is used to purchase rolling stock.

The DafT has a sticky hand in approving TOC train orders...in fact sometimes making it a condition of a franchise or management contract let.

TOC X places an order for new trains with manufacturer Y.

But nobody will supply trains to a a short term tenant without some cast iron guarantee, or the cash up front.

The usual type of arrangement is that a ROSCO will be used to take ownership and a financing package (how the trains are paid for) will be negotiated between the manufacturer, the ROSCO and importantly, a lender (the source of the capital).

Hence, the manufacturer gets paid for making and supplying the trains.

The ROSCO effectively takes a mortgage out on the trains and pays this back from the income it receives from leasing the trains to the TOC.

The manufacturer gets paid.

The ROSCO has a viable business model, where it makes a profit from lease income, minus finance costs, but takes on all the risk.

The TOC gets trains.

The government (Treasury, DafT etc) don't have to find the money to buy or lease trains directly. plus it's all off the PSBR spreadsheet.

An example when government (DafT) gets more intimately involved than usual in a train order.

The Intercity Express Programme (IEP), which resulted in a large order for the initial IET fleets supplied to GWR and LNER.

The DafT spend tens of millions in the lengthy and costly procurement process...

...however, the actual supply of the trains comes from Agility Trains, a ROSCO owned by Hitachi and AXA UK (originally the partner was John Laing).

The trains were paid for (and are ultimately owned) by an international banking consortium, including huge Japanese merchant banks, all managed by HSBC.

They in turn have a 27.5 year guarantee that the TOC's  or their successor will lease the trains, securing and guaranteeing the debt.

You can easily see that going back to the old way of buying trains (before BR starting leasing themselves), or the DafT /GBR or whoever taking over the ROSCO role, could lead to expensive and sometimes wasteful procurement exercises, no doubt with a lot of costly chopping and changing thrown in.

The chances of savings are very slim to highly unlikely.

The government would have to go and borrow the money itself or enter into a long term costly PFI (the never never...thank you Gordon Brown !! ), all which will add to the burgeoning government debt.

I contend there are far more urgent and important things for HMG to spend their pocket money on.

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30 minutes ago, melmerby said:

How different is the Labour "Great British Railway" from the Tories "Great British Railway"?

🙂

Labour's announcement is just a different flavour of the same thing.

The Tory idea is to find a new role for private sector involvement, in providing services to or on behalf of GBR, with the hope of installing commercial incentives and retaining access to external channels of capital.

Not quite the management contract arrangement, but something similar.

The dithering is because (as far as we know) nobody (government, DafT, the Treasury, the TOC's) has come up with a concrete plan.

From the scant detail put forward by Labour, it's sounds like they would like GBR to provide the TOC service, but still outsource in some areas.

They appear to be putting a lot of emphasis on making big savings and efficiencies, by removing duplication and complicated interfaces.

If you really want to achieve those sort of savings it would inevitably lead to lots of job losses.

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1 hour ago, C126 said:

 

As an ideological fool, can I just ask why a suitably composed law can not prohibit challenges?  If a theoretical govt wished to make freight go on a monopolistic railway (and was able to pass a law thus - a big caveat), why can it not pass a law to do this?  Sorry to open a can of worms, but I have often wondered why govts are made out to be impotent with things like this.  Thanks.

 

For one, we don't live in a totalitarian communist state.

Two; why would any government body need too get involved in running commercial transport services (outside of wartime or national emergency).

Do you expect them to control delivery of your groceries or your toy train purchases?

A return to British Road Services?  No thank you.

We may think that public operated passenger bus services are the best way to provide local public transport, but it doesn't follow that other road traffic, such as trucks and taxis, or whatever, have to be publicly operated.

Rail freight is a purely commercial business and we no longer depend on it for vital national supply lines, such as supplying coal.

The sector is doing reasonable well, considering the commercial ups and downs over the last dozen or more years and the loss of several major customers (coal, oil and steel etc,).

Labour recognise this, hence leaving it well alone, despite factions within the party wanting to nationalise all sorts of things or purely ideological reasons.

Anyway, it's not on the table from either so called "main party", so not worth considering.

.

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34 minutes ago, bmb5dnp1 said:

........are the ROSCOs a major problem ?    I must admit I don't know too much about them but I often see complaints that leasing costs/terms can be very high for outdated rolling stock and also there are sidings full of decent stock lying idle that have been prematurely replaced presumably at a high cost......

There was an issue back in the past, when the early ROSCO's took over the former BR stock, but most of that has gone.

The old BR stock was largely written down, but the leasing costs didn't reflect that.

However, the majority of passenger rail stock running today, has been provided by private sector finance over the last (now more than) quarter of a century.

The ROSCO's may own the rail stock, but they owe the purchase costs to a large number of banking and finance consortia.

Without those investors, there couldn't have been the mass re-equipment of passenger stock we've witnessed, over the 28 years post BR.

46 minutes ago, bmb5dnp1 said:

......I understand that the ROSCOs cannot be nationalised due to their ownership structures, the same applies to the freight companies apparently. I would have have thought that these 2 railway functions would have been a higher priority to nationalise/rationalise than the passenger TOCs ?

 

To "nationalise"  the ROSCO's would mean having to purchase all the rolling stock, which belongs to them and having to find a huge amount of money to pay back the lenders.

There's no way the treasury would allow that.

The sums involved would require serious major cuts elsewhere in public spending.

As for the Freight operating companies (FOC's), where is the need too nationalise them?

There is none whatsoever.

Also you can kiss goodbye to any notion of political policies to encourage more freight onto rail.

Nationalised rail freight would be a monopoly and therefore any actions that would penalise competing modes (basically road), would be anti-competitive, illegal and open to challenge.

Attempting to nationalise rail freight would be an ideological fools errand, which is why it's been left out of both Labour and Conservative proposals.

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First completed sections of HS2’s Curzon Street Station viaduct, revealed.

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Another infrastructure tunnel at Old Oak Common has been completed.

This is a 120 metre long, small bore tunnel under the Grand Union canal, designed to carry electrical power services to the eastern end of the OOC station box,.

Initially this tunnel will carry the power supply for the 2 TBM's, ordered for the construction of the Euston tunnels.

Once tunnelling to Euston is completed, this tunnel will then provide the power supply for the Euston tunnels from OOC to Euston.

https://barhale.co.uk/news/uk-power-networks-and-barhale-build-tunnel-to-power-hs2-construction-to-euston/

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"HS2 moves 1,100 tonne viaduct in weekend operation"

https://mediacentre.hs2.org.uk/news/in-pictures-and-video-hs2-moves-1-100-tonne-viaduct-in-weekend-operation

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An article explaining some of the ground condition difficulties encountered by TBM's "Sushila" and "Caroline", while tunnelling under the Ruislip area.

(remember the incidents with sludge bubbling up through boreholes, last year?)

https://www.geplus.co.uk/news/hs2-tbm-quartet-tackles-differing-geology-on-twin-bore-tunnel-under-london-22-04-2024/

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1 hour ago, KeithMacdonald said:

 

I didn't know either, so I looked it up.

 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concorde#Flight_characteristics

In normal operation, Concorde reached its maximum altitude at the end of its Atlantic crossing (see my post above about the “cruise climb”), before starting its descent and deceleration to subsonic flight.

Eastbound, it rarely ever reached FL600 and would normally start its descent from somewhere between FL570 and FL590 at the end of the cruise phase, before descending to subsonic flight at FL290 as it approached landfall.

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1 hour ago, Ducking Giraffe said:

.......Obviously if its like £20 there's no point i might as well buy the 21 pin chip in the first place!

 

I think you've answered your own question.

Just buy (or use) a decoder with the correct type of connector for the model.

Next18 decoders exist and are designed to fit a specific, clearly defined space to be provided within smaller locos.

This is to facilitate fitting in N, TT and very small H0/00 models.

The power rating on these decoders tends to be at the lower end of the scale and therefore they will not be suitable for H0/00 or larger scale models with more power hungry motors (e.g. many Heljan models).

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9 hours ago, rob D2 said:

Dunno how high Concorde went ……

 

Concorde crossed the Atlantic in what is known as a “cruise climb”.

A gradual increase in cruising level through the duration of the cruise phase of the flight.

After departure from London or Paris and being threaded through the regular traffic, it climbed out to an initial subsonic cruising level (FL280), following special designated routes, to reach the start of the dedicated Concorde oceanic tracks.

Because of the supersonic “bang”, it wasn’t allowed to fly at supersonic speeds, until over the sea.

On reaching the “acceleration point” beyond the coastline, they hit the reheat and began climbing rapidly and accelerating past Mach 1 towards supersonic cruising speed.

IIRC, they levelled off and began the gradual cruise climb somewhere between FL470 and FL500, reaching between FL580 and FL600, by the end of the supersonic part of the flight, on the other side of the ocean.

Unlike the normal Oceanic tracks, which change on a twice daily basis, to take into account the jet stream and other significant weather, the Concorde tracks were fixed.

They were obviously operating much higher and separated from all the other ocean air traffic.

There were 3 parallel tracks, SM, SN and SO.

Normally Westbound, Eastbound and an alternative overflow track, respectively; although the routes were bi-directional if needed.

BA and AF Concorde departures were timed so they would follow one another, but if the minimum separation at the track entry point was being eroded once they became airborne, the following aircraft would be re-cleared to the overflow track.

Coming off the oceanic Concorde tracks, they would request descent from the top of the cruise climb (whatever they had reached by the end of the cruise) and then carried out quite a speedy decent passing through a transonic phase, before achieving stable subsonic flight and eventually levelling off at (IIRC) FL290, as they arrived over land.

The inbound routing fed them into the regular airway system.

Some of you might remember stories about Concorde supersonic booms being heard in the West Country (Devon and Somerset) and the Channel Islands.

The supersonic shock wave would travel ahead of the aircraft and if the atmospheric conditions were right (or wrong, depending how you look at it), Concorde’s boom would continue forward towards landfall in the Bristol Channel (for London), or the Channel Islands and northern Brittany (for Paris ), even after the aircraft had decelerated through subsonic transition long before crossing the coast.

The Paris outbound route crossed the French coast near Le Havre, where they would begin supersonic acceleration and a rapid climb.

The route took them to the north of the Cherbourg peninsula in UK airspace, before turning SW down the middle of the English Channel, until passing abeam Lands End, where they would turn westwards towards the entry point of their cleared oceanic Concorde track.

Paris inbounds normally hit landfall as they passed directly over Jersey eastbound, crossing over the French coast just east of there.

However, there was an alternative, extended route that followed the track of the outbound route, eastbound up the Channel towards Dieppe.

This allowed the AF Concorde to stay supersonic for a bit longer, but it was only used occasionally.

London outbounds passed over the Bristol area before crossing the coast near Weston-super-Mare, prior to reaching the acceleration point out over the Bristol Channel, heading towards the Oceanic track entry.

Inbounds followed a similar route after leaving the eastbound track and descending to the subsonic flight level before crossing the coast and merging into the regular route structure.

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7 minutes ago, rob D2 said:

......I’ve just purchased this mug in recognition of my time on the plastic jet …it’s an engine mug ..Boeing do some good merch 

 

I bought a 737 MAX mug, on my visit to the Everett visitor centre a few years ago.

The handle fell off in the dishwasher !

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6 hours ago, Jeff Smith said:

I recently flew from Atlanta to Dublin on a Delta A350 and was surprised that we cruised at 50,000ft!

4 hours ago, 55020 said:

 

I hope not, as the service ceiling (the highest density altitude where a small rate of climb is still possible) of an A359 is 43,100 feet.

What was the date and flight number, as FR24 replay will let you check what Flight Level you ended up at?

 

Aircraft don't cruise at Altitudes, but at Flight Levels, based on the standard altimeter pressure setting.

Flight levels remain constant, but vary in altitude (both geographically and with time), depending on the local atmospheric pressure setting at any one particular position.

Assuming the A350 could find conditions to get up that high, the nearest cruising levels available are FL490 and FL510, which approximate to (+ or -) 49,000 and 51,000 ft.

There is no cruising level analogous with 50,000ft.

Normally, you would expect to see long haul flight A350's cruising between FL350 and FL430.

Above that, the only civil aircraft will (normally) be high performance business jets.

If you're interested, Mickey Mouse FR24 has a filtering option that allows you to filter out aircraft above (and/or below) a selectable altitude.

Set it to show only aircraft above 43,500ft and see if you can spot any civil airliners.

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Engineers ave been dismantling and removing TBM "Lydia", that was used to bore the Old Oak Common to Atlas Road logistics tunnel.

"Lydia" is a smaller TBM than those being used to bore the railway tunnels.

Note the size of the workers, next to this "smaller" TBM.....

Kibri and Walthers also do similar, but in 1:83 H0 scale.

1 hour ago, Hroth said:

 

At least it would put an end to HGV leapfrog contests! 🤪

 

They can still lower the pantograph and overtake.

The overhead is providing motive power and recharging the truck’s batteries.

IIRC, if the driver indicates to leave the lane under the wires (e.g. overtaking or turning off the road), the panto lowers automatically.

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