52
Rail Engineer • May 2016
ROLLING STOCK/DEPOTS
2014 Craigentinny power car. (Inset) power car named Craigentinny in 1984.
Nighttime servicing in inspection shed.
HST maintenance The depot’s core activity is HST maintenance for which its allocation is 32 power cars and 131 mark three coaches (including spare first, standard, buffet and guard coaches) of the VTEC HST fleet, 10 power cars and 40 mark three coaches of the CrossCountry HST fleet and the three HST power cars of Network Rail’s New Measurement Train (NMT). The Virgin and CrossCountry power cars have a progressive examination regime with A, B, C and D examinations being undertaken after 7,000, 21,000, 84,000 and 252,000 miles respectively, while the three NMT power cars have a different, balanced examination regime. Mark three coaches have A and B exams after 15,000 and 30,000 miles. Thereafter there is a balanced exam every 90,000 miles. Normally the ROSCO (rolling stock company - the train’s owner) would arrange for levels 4 and 5 rolling stock maintenance to be undertaken at a specialist workshop. However, Angel Trains and Porterbrook have agreed that the depot can do heavy maintenance of their HST fleets, for which there is a corresponding reduction train lease charge. Phil considers this to be a much more flexible arrangement which also avoids the need to move rolling stock to workshops and maximises fleet availability. This heavy maintenance requires the depot to manage the supply of sub-components. For example, power car bogies are changed at E, F and G exams as they have a maximum life of 630,000 miles. The new bogies are supplied from the Doncaster plant of LUR, a joint venture of Lucchini and Unipart. LUR also supplies the mark 3 coach bogies required for a C4 repair which can be done in a single day. These bogies are guaranteed for the 600,000 miles running between C4 repairs, although this is soon to be extended to 750,000 miles between overhaul. The Class 43 power cars have MTU V16 4000-series engines which are returned to MTU’s Magdeburg MRT (MTU Remanufacturing Technology) plant every 25,000 hours for remanufacturing, using components that have been restored to as-new condition. MRT also overhauls the alternator so MTU returns a fully overhauled and tested power unit. Thus, typically the depot will change one power car engine every two weeks.
Virgin red seats From a passenger perspective, the most obvious work currently being undertaken by the depot is the interior refurbishment of its HST fleet as part of a £21 million programme announced by Virgin Trains in November. This involves completely stripping out the nine mark 3 coaches in each train prior to replacing carpets and fittings throughout as well as refreshing the vestibules and toilets. The train’s 523 seats are replaced with those of a Virgin design which, not surprisingly, includes a lot of red - even in first class, the seats are charcoal leather with red trim. A search of the hashtag #PlushTush on Twitter shows this refurbishment to be popular with Virgin’s customers. For this work, one of the cleaning shed roads has a wide scaffold platform erected between the side of the shed and the train to provide both easy access and a storage/ working area. Halfway along the shed, a part of the wall has been removed to create a loading bay to transfer deliveries from lorries onto the platform. Other than for its project management, the refurbishment work does not use depot staff. Instead, personnel are supplied by a labour supply agency, with up to 41 staff working at any one time. The complete interior renewal requires a train set to be out of service for fourteen days. It takes eleven days to carryout the refurbishment, after which the coaches each receive a B exam. This includes a battery check as the set has been on shore supply for this time.