Great Western Coffee Shop

Went to Lomdon today. Am I glad I no longer travel every day?

Caught 09:21 (virtually all stations Pad from Taplow)

166 208 more of later.

Pretty full at Taplow, few seat I got one.  After Burnham full with a few seats but some standing after Slough full and standing.

Think we some behind at Hayes and Southall some by choice.

A lot got off at Ealing.

Saw 4 sheds one between West Drayton and hayes one at Hayes and 2 at Acton.

At least 5 FGW HSTs in Old Oak.

Three minute wait at Royal Oak 4 minute late at Padd platform 14.

Fairly pedestrian run but did hange gear ovr Warncliffe viaduct.

Walking down 11, what happened? An almost empty Up Greenford rolled down the paltform. Next time I'll hop out at Ealing and catch that and be in Padd at same time.

166 208 A/C worked in centre compartment of middle coach with all windows shut think it was struggeling a bit by Padd as had been in sun all he way.

Travelcard didn't work Padd barriers but subsequently worked LUL barriers.

Caught 16:22 Oxford HST changed Slough. Slow run in could have stopped anywhere from Uxbridge Road inward. 2 late arriving at least 4 late leaving. Full and standing to slough in coach D.

Also saw 16:40 from Slough to Padd left Slough around 6 late bet it was ontime PAdd..

Caught 16:43 left 16:44 arrived Taplow 16:54 left 16:55 still 4 down.

9:21 Taplow could do with being a 4/5 car.

General observation lack of briskness in running, slow station work at Slough.

There's no ungency!

However to be fair an HST with only 2 doors per coach is not the ideal train for a 15 minute commute.

Sorry to sound like a total goofball, but what is a "shed"?

I presume your not talking about the hut type shed, at the end of a persons garden?

A "shed" is a class 66 locomotive

source:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossary_of_United_Kingdom_railway_terminology

I don't understand the random inclusion of the sheds to be honest can you also just clarify how late you actually arrived

Sheds included to show multi use of railway.

Around 4 down at Padd on direct outward  09:21 ex Taplow.
4 down Taplow on 16:43 from Slough
Also Padd to Slough 16:22 Oxford arr Slough around 2 down Slough departed aorund 4 down.

Another observation. North pole maintenace depot empty what a waste of a purpose built facility with it's own wheel lathe, toilet emptying etc facilities.

Also something in steam at Southall on return journey.

The ridiculously conservative braking of some Turbo drivers really annoys me - although it's probably being driven into them by regulations. It often leads to late running east of Slough where the lines are used pretty intensively. I understand caution is required when approaching red signals, but surely when running under clear aspects into stations baking could be more aggressive?

Some HST drivers on the other hand still drive trains like they are supposed to, but get constantly held up by poor regulation at Airport Junction.

On an aside the GWML seems to have been much busier freightwise east of Reading over the last few weeks - is there a reason or have I just been lucky?

The Turbo braking instructions are far more defined than HST ones, so HST drivers do have more freedom.  Turbo drivers should always aim to use Step 1 braking for station stops, only using Step 2 or Step 3 if the retardation isn't sufficient, and even then always reverting to Step 1 before drawing to a stand.  This compares with instructions when they were first introduced which was to use Step 2 or 3 straight away to scrub the speed off quickly, before using Step 1 for the final bit into the station.

Newer drivers are noticeably slower as that's the way they have been taught.

I thought as much - a real shame as the Turbos are good trains but are failing to perform as well as they could becasuse of regulations. In many cases timings have slipped and the gains we experienced when they were introduced in the early 90's have been lost to recovery time and extra allowances for braking. Other opertators don't seem to enforce such rigorous braking rules - I asssume this was as a result of Ladbroke Grove? I know the Underground is perhaps not a fair comparison, but it goes to show how good trains can be at braking (on a system more intensively used than NR).

Indeed, there are some NSE era driver training videos floating about on the internet that instruct full service braking on disk braked stocked, before slowly easing up to a gradual stand.