Great Western Coffee Shop

On a 158 from Cardiff to Temple Meads there were no lights on inside the train. Not a problem usually but moving slowly through the tunnel before Newport and the Severn Tunnel meant the train was in darkness for some time. Is this allowed day to day or is it a faulty set still running as a train with no lights is better than a cancelled service? There were people feelng uneasy about the darkness so I'm guesing this wasn't meant to happen otherwise it is poor customer service

I'm 98% sure that that was actually illegal and against every H&S rule in the book...! That carriage should have been locked out of use...! Maybe worthy of an e-mail/letter to FGW??

Hmm.  We've had similar discussions about the lack of lighting in carriages in the Severn Tunnel area before: see http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=3584.0

About a year ago, I was on a Portsmouth - Cardiff 158 with no lighting in the centre coach.  It was becoming dark as we arrived at Southampton.  The guard "recommended" people move to the other carriages.  A SWT engineer boarded at Salisbury but didn't fix the problem.  The guard simply recommended that people use the other two carriages "unless they didn't mind sitting in the dark".

at a guess i would say it had a charging fault or main light mcb had tripped,as far as i am aware the carriage should not be used if in darkness however if it was not simply a tripped mcb the train crew could have operated the remote supply in middle car to give emergency lighting,providing it was not 798 then the light sticks should have been operated.
this leads me to believe the crew were unaware of the fault???

Northern use 142s with lights that don't work or are faulty and only work part of the time. 

I can't imagine operators should be allowed to use trains in long tunnels which have broken lights.  Long tunnels that come to mind are the Severn tunnel, Standedge tunnel and Mersey tunnel, but they're probably many more.

According to the reliable source that is Wikipedia, there are several tunnels.  One of these carries the canal with the others being railway tunnels.

Just to clarify there are four Standedge tunnels: one for the canal, a double track bore and two single track bores. Since the 60s only the double bore has been used for trains. The same was true for the Woodhead tunnels until the double bore closed in 1981.

To get back to a semblance of relevance, I suspect it would be frowned upon if Northern or Trans-Pennine Express moved passenger services through the tunnel without lighting on a regular basis - the speed limit is 60mph I think so it takes 3 minutes minimum to get through.

Try telling this to the North York Moors Railway!

OK, they may not fall under Network Rail jurisdiction, and they may only have one tunnel on the route which isn't your average Box Tunnel lenghth tunnel, but I was up there earlier in the month with my parents and we went on the NYMR, and during the in the tunnel bit of the journey, despite there being lights in the carriages, they were not turned on on either the outward or return journey.

I assume that the engine was running on the involved vehicle?

Running a train without lights in one coach is a far lesser evil than cancelling a train completely due to there being no train availble to replace it. This would also affect the loadings on other trains and also the next working for the train with no lights in one vehicle. Passengers should not normally be conveyed in the vehicle without lights in it although this is difficult to enforce on trains with no lockable gangway doors between coaches in the set.

On a class 158, loss of lights is commonly caused by low auxilary battery voltage due to the 'Alternator Excitation' circuit breaker having tripped. This is sometimes caused by loss of hydrostatic oil in the system that runs the radiator fans, the air con and the alternator. In fact loss of oil is generally found to be the problem if the circuit breaker trips repeatedly with the train saloon lights turned off in order to reset it.

since refresh it is possible to gain emergency lighting with no charging by tripping the remote supply on the 158 fleet with the exception of 58715 car of 798.if it is loss of hydro oil then engine should be isolated.
it has been known for the AVR board or mag amp to cause alt mcb to trip aswell as low engine rpm