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Diesel maintenance has finally left the steam age
Back in the summer of '63 I was sitting in the English Electric site hut at Finsbury Park depot marshalling Deltic fleet performance statistics when a familiar shape in an unfamiliar colour scheme rolled past the window. DP2 had arrived.
DP2 was the ‘23 rd Deltic' built to demonstrate the latest version of the EE Vee-16 diesel, which was now giving 2,700hp with the addition of charge air cooling. Lord Nelson of Stafford , the founder of EE, had already shown with the prototype Deltic (Diesel Prototype 1) that if you wanted to sell something, a successful demonstration in service was always pretty persuasive – as my current job proved.
Even though the 16 cylinder 16CSVT had the same rating per cylinder as the 12CSVT in the Class 37 – at least for export orders, British Rail's Chief Mechanical Engineer had a thing about Sulzers and considered our engine as unproven compared with the 12LDA28C, also rated at 2700hp,and going into the Brush Class 47. History tells us that it was a rating too far, but by then it was too late.
Meanwhile, the 16CSVT and me had ‘history'. I had spent many happy hours on the floor of the Test House at Rugby in charge of the engine during its static testing. In my youthful naivety I thought it very kind of my boss to let me do the exciting work while he sat at a desk writing reports based on my figures.
So at Finsbury Park I took a special interest in DP2, occasionally going along as a supernumerary riding fitter. And we worked her hard, the only time off for maintenance being from 08.30 to 15.30 on Sundays.
By the time DP2 returned to the works for new bogies and an engine strip the locomotive had covered 43,000 trouble free miles in 58 consecutive days running. Pretty good for 1963.
Of course, the critics claimed that she had benefit from TLC and it was true. Fluid levels were checked regularly and topped up as necessary. In fact the strip showed up a slight coolant leak in one turbocharger which less attentive maintenance could have seen turn into a low water trip.
Alright, granddad, what's this got to do with the 21 st Century railway? Well back in May, MTU released details of the £70m, 11 year service package for its Series 4000 diesel engines being fitted to First Great Western's IC125 fleet. According to MTU it is the largest service contract in the company's history.
Under this ‘comprehensive blanket package', the company will guarantee engine operation for the first 10 years. And when MTU says ‘comprehensive' it means comprehensive.
For a start, all the necessary services will be available on site at all times. Many maintenance deals are based on a 24 hour call-out, but MTU service specialists will be on-call at FGW's main depot, with a stores containing the full range of spare parts and consumables.
MTU engineers, working with FGW depot staff, will also be responsible for all levels of maintenance through to major overhaul. Predicted wear rates, derived from operational experience will be used to schedule preventative maintenance, eliminating what MTU calls ‘wear-based downtime' . MTU reckons that the failure probability rate under this regime is under one percent.
Most of which is pretty much what we were doing at Finsbury Park with the Deltics and DP2. And it is the antithesis of the traditional malign neglect of diesel traction on British Rail going back over to the 1955 Modernisation Plan.
Apart from the steam traction mentality of treating diesel locomotives as metal boxes into which you put fuel and, usually, oil and coolant, which persisted through to privatisation, BR also had a tendency to replace manufacturers' components with cheaper generic items. This stemmed from the pervading belief that private sector manufactures were always trying to rip off the state railway. Paxman belatedly discovered that problems with Valenta cylinder heads in IC125s, which cost millions to cure, stemmed in part from a free-lance decision to fit a cheaper head gasket that the OEM item.
Treatment in service was pretty brutal too. For example, fear that a locomotive would not start in the morning, saw engines kept idling overnight – bad news for turbochargers, cylinder where and fuel dilution of lubricating oil. .
Now, with the FGW contract, MTU has gained near-total control over the treatment of its engines. For example, the contract puts a limit on idling time.
Even more draconian is the requirement for the coolant to be pre-heated before the engine can be started. Obviously a warm engine will start more promptly and suffer less wear during the critical period while components expand up to working temperature.
Modern technology allows such conditions to be imposed by the engine itself through electronic control system, or, engine management system in modern parlance. For example the engine cannot be started until the coolant has been pre-heated to 40 deg C.
This takes around 90min. So if you have forgotten to preheat – tough luck, the delay minutes are down to the depot.
So diesel engineers everywhere should raise their glasses of seckt to MTU for overcoming fifty years of hurt. And Cummins and others must be wondering how they can do the same.
Another diesel issue, where I must confess to dereliction of duty, concerns the Class 66 cab. A few years back I road a Freightliner Heavy Haul coal train from Immingham.
It wasn't long into the journey before I was criticising the ambience. The noise level was such that I wasn't joking when I commented that ear defenders would be essential were I to spend my working day in the cab.
With the engine rigidly mounted to the locomotive underframe, the vibration also showed up in rattles and buzzes. Sitting down all day could generate the gluteal equivalent of ‘white finger'.
Finally, the violent jerk during the General Motors equivalent of field diverts was just as bad as when I complained about it to the GM rep after my first ride in the Class 59. He said something would be done about it, but it was obviously standard GM control system practice.
But Freightliner asked me not to criticise this less than ideal working environment as they were in discussion with the unions about it. And, since I wasn't testing the locomotive but reporting on a traffic flow, I complied.
Last year Aslef got on the case, by which time the number of Class 66 operators had increased. A deadline of 28 February this year was set for the operators to bring forward proposals to improve the cab environment. GB Railfreight, also on behalf of DRS and Freightliner, is taking the lead on trials of air conditioning units and improved seating.
But, of course these fleets represents only a proportion of the Class 66 community. And to the noise and ‘white bum' threat, global warming has added a another problem.
An RSSB study correlated last summer's heat wave with a small increase in SPADs. And clearly, if you are uncomfortable in any driving situation – car, lorry, bus or aircraft, your concentration will be affected.
A few years back I had a go behind the wheel of heavy lorry and the ambience and facilities were probably better than my car. Which makes the antediluvian Class 66 cab even less excusable.
And it seems that overheated cabs have become the new focus of discontent. Aslef has advised all its members to refuse to work in train cabs if the temperature is above 27°C.
As for the Class 66, Aslef set a new deadline of 18 June, after which ‘members should refuse to work trains which are operated by Class 66 locomotives'. And I can't argue with them because the ‘66' is a rough and ready loco designed to do a job at a price, and the job does not include driver comfort.
DP2 – true heroism on the footplateSpeaking of DP2, I was reminded of my favourite locomotive by Virgin's ill considered and ultimately self defeating spin about the ‘heroism' by the driver of the Pendolino in the Grayrigg derailment. In a high speed derailment the driver is invariably a passenger and the best you can hope for is that when everything stops you are fit enough to get on the radio and try to protect the train. A chum who questioned the claims in print at the time was phoned up by Virgin's spin meister and warned that if he kept on challenging Sir Richard Branson's line he would look very silly when the truth came out. And Sir Richard himself wrote to the paper defending his claims. It all left me with a nasty taste because it diminished true heroism by drivers over the years – for example in the cab of DP2 exactly 40 years ago, this coming month. On 31 July DP2, at the head of the 12.00 from Kings Cross was powering across the Vale of York at 80 mile/h when Driver Evans saw a cloud of dust erupt across the slow and main down lines 400 yards ahead. As the dust cleared he saw that a cement wagon on the train ahead had derailed into their path. Driver Evans immediately applied the vacuum brake the Westinghouse brake, took his foot off the DSD pedal and applied sand. With possible death seconds away, Second Man Dennis Smith picked up his bag and took out three detonators, opened his door, to prevent it jamming shut. Braced himself against the door post, he was ready to protect the train if he survived. Just before DP2 hit the wagon, with the speed down to 40 mile/h Driver Evans threw himself to the right. Both men survived the collision and were able to protect the train. But seven passengers died as the wagon ripped into the sides of six coaches. That, Sir Richard, is real cool headed heroism.
There is a light hearted sequel to the story. Regional Manager Gerard Fiennes was on the scene within the hour and after debriefing the train crew arranged for his chauffeur to drive them back to Gateshead . Within a few miles the car's brakes failed. According to the chauffeur their reaction was ‘this is bloody dangerous, take us to the nearest station'. |