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INFORMED SOURCES May 2007

Coming to a railway near you

GWML and ECML should be all-IEP by 2020

Table 1

Provisional delivery schedule

Source: Informed Sources analysis

As with the British Rail Class 91 locomotive contract, there will be a pre-Series build of IEP for shakedown testing in revenue earning service before production starts in earnest. As reported last month, the aim is to build 10 ‘half sets' which will be marshalled to create five full length IEP and also demonstrate splitting and formations for onward running.

Three electric plus seven ‘dual powered' (diesel and electric) half-sets would be built. These would allow the formation of one full length electric train, one electric/dual powered and two dual-powered trains.

I nearly made an awful faux pas with the configuration of the pre-series units. The Functional Specification refers to ‘half' length trains ‘dual powered, capable of both electric and self powered operation'.

Now, although the wording seemed unambiguous, I could not believe that each dual powered half set would have a diesel power car at one end plus a transformer and pantograph. But a quick check with the ever helpful DfT Rail press office confirmed that this is indeed the case and that all the half sets will have a cab at each end and able to run independently.

Fun

So it's going to be fun and games for the development engineers of whoever wins the InterCity East Coast franchise. the franchise ITT includes the requirement to cost the additional resources to assist in ‘the management of the delivery of the IEP pre-series trains on the ECML in the summer of 2012'. My advice to bidders is think of a number and square it.

Just think abouthaving ten bi-directional half sets on depot, capable of being coupled in any combination. Will there be inner ‘electric ends' with corridor connections to form full length trains? In which case the spare set is bound to have the diesel power car at the ‘wrong' end when another dual power set goes down at the last moment.

And will both ends have to be 125mile/h capable? And will the all electric units have to be able to provide though connections at both ends? And what does that do for aerodynamics and crashworthiness. One thing is for sure, someone should already be seeking to rescind the ban on passengers in the leading vehicle at over 100mile/h.

Testing

Test running of the Pre-Series fleet on the East Coast Main Line is scheduled to start in May 2012. Routine running in revenue earning service as part of the InterCity East Coast (ICEC) fleet would follow in December that year.

Routes are: Kings Cross-Leeds via Wakefield and onward to Bradford Harrogate and Skipton; Kings Cross-Hull via both Goole and Selby; and Kings Cross-Newcastle. These routes will allow all the combinations of electric, diesel and dual power traction to be tested in service, including half sets splitting and joining.

Particular attention will be paid to putting mileage on the diesel trains The aim is to run them through two summer seasons and the intervening winter. This is expected to generate a minimum of 2 million train set miles.

In this case I suspect we are talking half train set miles. With seven half sets that comes down to 285,000 miles in 18 months.

Fleet service

Series production trains, incorporating any modifications identified by the pre-series trains, are expected to start entering revenue earning service between one and two years after the completion of the 18 month service trials – ideally, sooner rather than later.

Initial series deliveries will be to the Great Western Main Line, followed by replacement of the ICEC fleet. Together this would require around 1000 vehicles.

Assuming that further business cases can be made, IEP production would then continue, with the trains progressively taking over services on the Midland Main Line, New Cross Country, the London-Birmingham-Wolverhampton and London Manchester services on the West Coast Main line, Liverpool Street-Norwich and Trans-Pennine Express.

While the life expiry of existing stock, plus the 2020 drop-dead date for compliance with the Rail Vehicle Accessibility Regulations (RVAR), drives delivery of the East Coast and Great Western fleets, the subsequent builds could see the heavy weight low-capacity 22x Diesel Electric Multiple Unit fleets coming off lease after 20 years' service life.

There is also a reference to a possible batch of electric IEP for delivery in 2013. Readers may have a better solution, but I reckon this could be aimed at early replacement of Class 390 on West Midlands Services – especially if the proposed lengthening by two cars fails to materialise.

Continues.........