Class 180s return to the Cotswolds

[whole diary]

[Worcester_Passenger]

The knock-on effect of this morning's incident with the cows has resulted in the 11:20 Padd'n - Great Malvern departing Padd'n 60 minutes late and skipping Slough and Reading. Ominously, it's now shown as "delayed".

Meanwhile, the 12:21 Padd'n - Great Malvern left on time but is now 13 late on departure from Slough.

[Worcester_Passenger]

11:20 Padd'n - Great Malvern now terminated at Oxford due to "further delays at Hayes and Harlington". And the 12:21 now 22 late from Oxford.

[Richard Fairhurst]

And now delays due to "a problem with lineside equipment at Charlbury"...

[ray951]

I thought I would add my first experience of an Adelante (180102) which was interesting.
I caught the 17.06 Oxford to Paddington to Didcot, this service had previously been a 3 car turbo.
The train left Oxford 9 minutes late due to late running preceding trains and arrived at Didcot 20 minutes late due to several issues.
The first was just a general lack of passenger familiarisation, especially those with bicycles, leading to longer dwell times at Radley and Culham. Not sure that they should be used on these stoppers as a lot of bicycles are carried, a cyclist was left at Oxford due to lack of space and the bicycles loaded at Radley and Culham must have been placed in the vestibules.
The second issue was that it couldn't pull away from Radley and required the onboard staff  (fitters or instructors?) to fix/reset something before it could leave. Judging by their expression this may have been down to driver error rather than an issue with the train.
There also seemed to be an issue with the aircon which was working and great on a day like today compared with the normal non-aircon Turbo we have on this service, but it was still hot and I am sure there was heat coming out of the heaters, they certainly felt warm to touch.

But once they sort out the aircon and other teething issues they seem like a nice train to travel in and are certainly a lot smoother and quieter than the turbo.

[JayMac]

Thank-you for those observations, ray951.

Not being a regular traveller on FGW^▸ (First Great Western)'s Thames Valley routes, I can't really comment on your post. Others on this forum may have an input.

In the meantime may I extend a warm welcome to the Coffee Shop forum. 

[Btline]

I thought I would add my first experience of an Adelante (180102) which was interesting.
I caught the 17.06 Oxford to Paddington to Didcot, this service had previously been a 3 car turbo.
The train left Oxford 9 minutes late due to late running preceding trains and arrived at Didcot 20 minutes late due to several issues.
The first was just a general lack of passenger familiarisation, especially those with bicycles, leading to longer dwell times at Radley and Culham. Not sure that they should be used on these stoppers as a lot of bicycles are carried, a cyclist was left at Oxford due to lack of space and the bicycles loaded at Radley and Culham must have been placed in the vestibules.
The second issue was that it couldn't pull away from Radley and required the onboard staff  (fitters or instructors?) to fix/reset something before it could leave. Judging by their expression this may have been down to driver error rather than an issue with the train.
There also seemed to be an issue with the aircon which was working and great on a day like today compared with the normal non-aircon Turbo we have on this service, but it was still hot and I am sure there was heat coming out of the heaters, they certainly felt warm to touch.

But once they sort out the aircon and other teething issues they seem like a nice train to travel in and are certainly a lot smoother and quieter than the turbo.

Correct: the 180s most certainly not work on stopping services! They should be stretching their legs at 125mph between Pad and Oxf on the fast lines before using their superior acceleration to stop at Cotswold stations.

I'm surprised that the air con was dodgy - still better than a Thames Turbo where there are only two settings: "Off" and "Broken".

I have to say, the reliability issues are worrying. I support the replacement of the remaining Turbos if HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train) are not available, but us Cotswold line folk should not have to tolerate further unreliability as we've had for years on the single track.

[JayMac]

but us Cotswold line folk should not have to tolerate further unreliability as we've had for years on the single track.

I wasn't aware that you tolerated such things, Btline. Here's me thinking you headed over to Warwick Parkway and availed yourself of Chiltern's (allegedly) superior service.   

[Southern Stag]

Correct: the 180s most certainly not work on stopping services! They should be stretching their legs at 125mph between Pad and Oxf on the fast lines before using their superior acceleration to stop at Cotswold stations.

That's what they do Off-Peak but at peak times everything on the Cotswold line is an HST^▸ (High Speed Train). Everything past Moreton-in-Marsh is now booked a 180 or HST except for the morning halts train. The reason the 180s are on stopping services is because in the peaks all the fast services to Oxford are HSTs. It's either using them on stopping service, replacing HSTs which would be very unpopular or just leaving them idle at peak times. At least if they replace a 3-car Turbo that 3-car Turbo can then be used to strengthen another service.

[IndustryInsider]

The second issue was that it couldn't pull away from Radley and required the onboard staff  (fitters or instructors?) to fix/reset something before it could leave. Judging by their expression this may have been down to driver error rather than an issue with the train.

A passenger activated the alarm in the disabled toilet, so that needed to be investigated and reset.  The design of the emergency alarms in the toilet was always a problem as they were occasionally mistaken as a flush handle!  Similarly the 'Call For Aid' button by the wheelchair space often gets activated by people stowing luggage against it. 

As you say, passenger familiarisation will be an issue on those trains which they haven't worked before and, this time of year especially, there are loads of cycles on services from Oxford<>Culham<>Didcot.

[Btline]

True about peak times. But it's a shame to not utilise the 125mph.

I use both FGW^▸ (First Great Western) and Chiltern depending on the circumstances (time, final destination, etc). The Chiltern service from Kidderminster is better, hence I use it more. It now has the same journey time as FGW from WOF, despite taking a much longer route and being limited to 100mph.

[Southern Stag]

Some of the peak services are the ones which run on the main lines to/from Maidenhead, so still get some 125mph running.

[IndustryInsider]

Some of the peak services are the ones which run on the main lines to/from Maidenhead, so still get some 125mph running.

Not that any of them are capable of reaching 125mph at the moment.  Three engines out of five is currently the norm...

[Southern Stag]

It's not good considering they're meant to have had the reliability improvements. Have 4 managed to make it out in service yet? All the 180 diagrams are in action now, but I know one on Monday was being worked by a 166 instead. Be interesting on Fridays when presumably all 5 are required in service with the 1551 to cover as well as the usual diagrams.

[amiddl]

I have a few days off next week and having never travelled the cotswold line fancy a 180 day out from reading - any suggestions on a good day out with 180 rather than 166/hst journeys???

[Andrew1939 from West Oxon]

If amiddl wants a 180 trip on the CL, I would not recommend it at present. Too may 180s are cancelled (and other trains). I had to go to Moreton yesterday afternoon and planned to catch the 15.29 from HND that should have been a 180. However the preceding 14.29 Turbo had been cancelled at Oxford due to train failure and the 180 was replaced by a 3-car turbo 166, presumably it had also failed. It was packed, having to take two train loads with a lot of very unhappy FGW^▸ (First Great Western) customers. Almost every seat taken and people standing. For an off-peak train, it is always busy but not over crowded because the next Down CL train is 90 minutes later. The so-called air con. was not working. Why, when new air-con was supposed to have been put in less than a year ago? My return Up train was delayed at Charbury because the 15.51 ex PAD^» (Paddington (London) - next trains) was running about 15 minutes late. This then delayed the 17.32 Down stopper from Oxford that lost further time to be 14 minutes late at MIM. Was it an Adelante that could not cope with so many cyclists causing the further delays. Its a good job it has 10 minutes recovery time at EVE.

Regarding the comment about a 180 being held up because of an alarm button being erroneously pressed, I remember doing that on a very overcrowded HST^▸ (High Speed Train) some years ago. I was standing in the disabled seat area but with no disabled occupant and there were so may people standing in that area I was crushed between other travellers and the wall, just where the big red help button is located. At almost every jerk of the train, I could not help but press the button. The driver or guard called back first few times but then gave up when I told him over the speaker that I could not avoid pressing the button due to the crush.

I also understand that two CL HSTs departing PAD last night were 80 minutes late at Hereford with the final Down train of the day an hour late. This morning it is the same again with the 09.50 ex PAD running late and the UP 09.54 ex GMV cancelled. We seem to be going back to the days of a few years ago when FGW was threated with losing the franchise unless it pulled its socks up. Today it seems to be the failure of both NR^» (Network Rail - home page) for infrastructure failure and FGW for train failures and unavailability of staff.