Northern Seeks Battery-Hybrid Class 195 Variant
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on Railway Gazette.
This is the introduction to the article.
Northern Trains is seeking to introduce a battery-diesel hybrid version of its CAF Class 195 diesel multiple-units.
The article makes these points.
- The trains will be used on the lines modernised under the TransPennine Upgrade.
- Offers for trains with finance is being requested.
- Technology similar to Chiltern Rail’s Class 165 Hydrive train from Magtec would be ideal.
But I am not sure that this is the right train.
In How Much Electrification Will There Be In The TransPennine Route Upgrade?, I came to this conclusion.
By electrifying all the lines in the TransPennine Upgrade, it would allow all the stopping and slower services to be run by battery-electric trains.
I also said that battery-electric trains from both Hitachi and CAF had enough range to work all the TransPennine routes.
Given that I had my first ride in a battery-electric train in 2015, they have certainly been a long time coming.
It’s almost, as if the Men from the Ministry believe that battery trains will be inferior to diesel.
Shuffling The Class 165 Trains
The May 2020 Edition of Modern Railways has an article, which is entitled West Of England Improvements In GWR Deal.
The sub-title is the following.
EMU Trailers Could Be Inserted Into Turbo DMUs
GWR‘s Turbo DMUs are.
- Class 165 trains of which there are fifteen three-car trains and twenty two-car trains.
- Class 166 trains of which there are twenty-one three-car trains.
The article says, they will be internally-refreshed with interiors better suited for long-distance services.
It also looks that they might get hybrid transmissions, if a trial with a Chiltern Class 165 train is successful. In Class 165 Trains To Go Hybrid, I wrote about this trial.
The article says this about the retractioned units.
The additional power available from the new hybrid units would allow the sets to be lengthened with trailers released from withdrawn Class 365 or 465 EMUs, lengtheing two-car Turbos by one vehicle and the three-car sets to five carriages. The EMU vehicles are 20 metres long, rather than the 23 metres of the DMU design, but it is thought integration into the diesel sets would be relatively simple.
This sounds like a cunning plan, from BREL’s book of Cut-And-Paste With Trains.
At the time of writing there are nineteen Class 365 trains in storage, which could release 38 trailer cars. However, Varamis Rail may need some of these trains for their proposed parcel business, that I wrote about in Varamis Plans Electric Freight To Carry Light Goods.
If all the fifty-six trains were to be lengthened, this would need ninety-two trailer cars. So I suspect, that GWR will be awaiting the retirement of some of the 147 Class 465 trains, which are currently in service with Southeastern.
A sister company to GWR, South Western Railway is transferring thirty Class 707 trains to Southeastern. I wrote about the transfer in Southeastern Signs Deal To Lease Unwanted Class 707s. As each pair of Class 707 trains, could release two Class 465 trains containing four trailer cars, this could be the source of sufficient trailer cars to lengthen the Turbos.
This would mean that the following suitable trailer cars would be available.
- Thirty-eight from stored Class 365 trains.
- Sixty from Class 465 trains displaced by Class 707 trains at Southeastern.
It’s a close-run thing.
But there may be trouble ahead, as Chiltern have twenty-eight two-car and eleven three-car Class 165 trains, which would need another fifty trailer cars, if Chiltern decided to lengthen their trains in the same way as GWR.
- There appear to be twenty-one trains or forty-two trailer cars in service with Great Northern.
- Six trailer cars should be available from the previous swaps.
So it looks like they are one train or two trailer cars short, if they want to do a full conversion.
Unless the thirty Class 707 trains going to Southeastern, with their faster operating speed can scoot route the network faster and do the work of more than thirty Class 465 trains.
Flirt Akku Battery Multiple-Unit Unveiled
The title of this post is the same as that of this article in Railway Gazette International.
This is the first paragraph.
Stadler has officially unveiled the prototype Flirt Akku, a version of its Flirt family of electric multiple-units which is equipped with a battery to permit operation on non-electrified or partly-electrified routes.
So it looks like another train with batteries, that joins the following, that have been announced in recent months.
- Angel Trains’ Class 165 Hydrive, that I wrote about in Class 165 Trains To Go Hybrid.
- Bombardier Talent 3, that I wrote about in Bombardier Introduces Talent 3 Battery-Operated Train.
- Class 230 train, that I wrote about in Battery Class 230 Train Demonstration At Bo’ness And Kinneil Railway.
- Porterbrook Class 350/2 Battery/FLEX, that I wrote about in Porterbrook Makes Case For Battery/Electric Bi-Mode Conversion.
There are also several projects using MTU Hybrid Power Packs.
What new projects will emerge in the next couple of years?
The Future Of Great Western Railway’s Class 165 Trains
My excursion to Greenford was to get a detailed look at the Class 165 train that works the Greenford Branch.
I took these pictures.
Note.
- The trains are internally in reasonable condition.
- They have a Universal Access Toilet.
- This particular train had a large number of well-placed point points and USB sockets.
The interior would not need much work to bring it up to a very good standard.
Moving To Bristol
The majority of the trains are moving to the Bristol area to provide local services including some longer distance ones to Cardiff, Exeter and Gloucester.
Conversion To Class 165 HyDrive Trains
If the initial conversion of a Chiltern Class 165 train to a hybrid train, that I wrote about in Class 165 Trains To Go Hybrid, is a successful conversion, I think there could be several reasons to look at converting Great Western Railways trains.
- Improved performance.
- Less noise and pollution.
- Lower operating costs.
- The marketing value of a hybrid train
The financial details will decide whether the conversion is worthwhile.
Could Class 165 HyDrive Trains Be The Solution To The Greenford Branch?
I ask this question, as I think the Greenford Branch should be developed and run at a frequency of four trains per hour (tph).
I give my reasons in An Illustration Of Why The Greenford Branch Needs Four Trains Per Hour.
The Class 165 HyDrive Train
I described the proposed Class 165 HyDrive trains in Class 165 Trains To Go Hybrid.
These are given as the advantages of these and other hybrid trains.
- Improved acceleration.
- Smooth and powerful regenerative braking.
- Less gaseous and noise emissions.
A two-car Class 165 train can already run on the branch, so I’m pretty sure, that to run on the route,, a Class 165 HyDrive train would require no new major infrastructure, like lengthened platforms or electrification.
The Track Layout Of The Greenford Branch
The Greenford Branch is double-track.
This map from carto.metro.free.fr shows the track layout at Greenford station.
Note that both tracks of the branch, are connected to the following.
- The bay platform in Greenford station, where the service on the branch terninates.
- Both tracks of the Acton-Northolt Line going West using Greenford West Junction.
- Both tracks of the Acton-Northolt Line going East using Greenford East Junction.
It is a well-designed junction, where all required movements seem possible.
This map from carto.metro.free.fr shows the track layout at West Ealing station.
Unlike at Greenford station, it appears that, there is no connection from the bay platform at West Ealing station to the left track towards Greenford station.
This might make it difficult to run the more frequent service of four tph, that this line needs.
So there might be a need for an extra crossover or minor track updates.
The Current Passenger Service On The Greenford Branch
The current service is two tph, which is based on a single train, shuttling backwards and forwards.
- West Ealing to Greenford – 12 minutes
- Turnround at Greenford – 3 minutes
- Greenford to West Ealing – 11 minutes
- Turnround at West Ealing – 4 minutes
Obviously, the train can only do two round trips in an hour.
Service Improvements With The Class 165 HyDrive Train
The proposed Class 165 HyDrive train will not offer and dramatic improvements, but its superior acceleration and braking, could speed up the three intermediate stops by a minute or two.
But I doubt that this would be enough time savings to enable one train to achieve the much-needed four tph.
Four Tph On The Greenford Branch
This could be achieved by two trains.
Train 1 would run as follows.
WE Dep – XX:00
GF Arr – XX:12
GF Dep – XX:15
WE Arr – XX:26
WE Dep – XX:30
GF Arr – XX:42
GF Dep – XX:45
WE Arr – XX:56
Train 2 would run as follows.
WE Dep – XX:15
GF Arr – XX:27
GF Dep – XX:30
WE Arr – XX:41
WE Dep – XX:45
GF Arr – XX:57
GF Dep – XX:00
WE Arr – XX:11
Note how Train 2 is fifteen minutes behind Train 1.
With the track improvements at West Ealing station, two Class 165 trains could run this timetable, if they were well driven and nothing went wrong.
But I believe that if the more agile Class 165 HyDrive trains were to be used, they could use their performance to regain the timetable.
Their extra performance might also allow the creation of some extra paths for freight trains and empty stock movements.
Conclusion
Four tph is possible on the Greenford Branch, but it will need an extra crossover just outside West Ealing station.
Class 165 HyDrive trains with their extra performance would make the four tph timetable more reliable.
The lower noise and emissions of the trains would also please the local residents.
I also feel that a well-designed battery-powered two-car train, with perhaps a charging station at either end could also provide the improved service.
Class 165 Trains To Go Hybrid
There must be something in the DNA of British Rail’s rolling stock.
Mark 3-based trains like the InterCity 125, Class 319 and Class 321 trains seem to have had collectively more lives than a city full of feral cats.
It is also understandable, that MTU are looking at upgrading modern rolling stock built with their engines to be more efficient and environmentally-friendly. They have launched the MTU Hybrid PowerPack, which adds up to four 30 kWh batteries, electric drive and regenerative braking to a typical diesel multiple unit built in the last twenty years.
So now, upgrading the traction systems of the Class 165 trains is being undertaken.
The Wikipedia entry for Class 165 trains, says this under Future Development.
It was reported in September 2018 that Angel Trains were to convert class 165 units for Chiltern Railways to hybrid diesel and battery-powered trains, and that the first Class 165 HyDrive train should be ready by late 2019.
There is more in this article on Rotherham Business, which is entitled Magtec Changes Track To Convert Diesel Trains.
This is said.
Magtec, the UK’s largest supplier of electric vehicle drive systems, is working to deliver the rail industry’s first conversion of a diesel-powered train to hybrid drive.
Founded in 1992, MAGTEC designs and manufactures electric drive systems and components for a wide range of applications including trucks, buses and military vehicles.
This is also said about the modified trains performance.
In future, passengers using the Class 165 HyDrive could benefit from potentially reduced journey times, thanks to the improved acceleration offered by the hybrid technology compared to its diesel-only counterparts. Additionally, when the hybrid system detects proximity to stations or depots, it will turn the engines off and run on its battery, removing gaseous and noise emissions from populated areas.
That sounds very good to me.
There is also a serious article in the Financial Times, which is entitled Hybrid Battery Trains Set To Shorten Commuter Journey Times.
The headline sounds like hype, but then it is the FT, who usually tell it as it is. Read the article and there is a lot of philosophy and reasons behind this avalanche of retrofitting old trains with new innovative traction systems, in Germany, France and the UK.
It should be remembered that Chiltern have a record of doing the right things.
Further Development
MAGTEC look to be a very innovative company.
The Class 465 train is a third-rail electric train, that is closely-related to the Class 165 train.
It should be noted that sixteen miles of the London to Aylesbury Line is electrified using London Underground’s fourth-rail system.
So could we see the creator’s of the Class 165 HyDrive train, raid the Class 465 train’s parts bin, so the trains can use London Underground’s electrification?
Conclusion
If the project produces a successful outcome, there are seventy-five Class 165 trains running on Chiltern and Great Western Railway, which all seem to be in good condition.
The Anonymous Widower 