41 new ICR centre cars

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121848110#Comment_121848110

My understanding is that the absence of night time heavy exams at Inchicore means that six is probably the max you will get in service on any one day. Also, let’s be honest, the sets were never as reliable as CAF painted them out to be which has not helped in terms of maintenance levels. Unfortunately, things can and do change from original plans.

To be honest only having one maintenance spare is very tight regardless. One on exam, one as cover and the rest in service would be more realistic.

Just to point that all eight sets are in service - they rotate lest anyone gets the wrong impression.

trellheim

There is no mention of Mk4 unreliability I can see in IE annual reports or any publication that warrant keeping a 7th set out of line service, or was there off the record briefings to the NTA ?

With the 7th , even if it fails, there's another train an hour behind all day long unless its the last train of the night. So no real need for a hot spare and as I say the released 22 ( or isnt there two of them ? ) can pull a late or a few duties to somewhere useful with maybe an extra ICR carriage inserted.

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121848480#Comment_121848480

That’s not where you get those sort of explanations.

The first line of my answer above tells you my understanding (which may be wrong but I don’t believe it is) of why there are only six in daily service.

I still consider it better to have a reserve in any case to deliver a reliable service.

There will be more ICR services later in the year I believe on other routes as the sets are reformed with the additional centre cars and more drivers are passed out, which may include later services. The latter has been the main issue preventing additional trains from operating, as it’s just a slow process to train new drivers (12 months) and services are being added incrementally.

Citizen Six

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121848520#Comment_121848520

It doesn’t take 18 months to train a driver. Probably less than a year.

AngryLips

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121848520#Comment_121848520

So why did they under-order for Dublin-Cork in that case?

end of the road

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121849226#Comment_121849226

good question.

i know the mk4 were ordered in 2005, but presumably at the time they had a fair idea they wouldn't keep the mk3 stock long term, or at least they would be cascaded to other routes if the decision to withdraw them didn't come until later?

Bodan

A second railcar was added to the service on march 1st.

thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2024-Photos/March-2024/i-H4PJJ2j

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121849226#Comment_121849226

They weren’t ordered for Dublin/Cork - they were originally planned to be used on pretty much each route out of Heuston (hence the maps in the vestibules).

It was some time after the order was made that the decision was made to introduce an hourly Dublin/Cork service using the coaches.

goingnowhere

The Mk4 fleet is

8 sets + 3 spare standard class coaches.

It was never actually purchased for an hourly Dublin Cork, but the S&W manager of the time pushed for an hourly service and thats just about doable with 7 sets available. To operate Dublin Cork reliably you need, 7 sets, 1 hot standby, 1 spare and then a spare of everything (so 1 std, 1 std end, 1 buffer, 1 first, 1 control car)

There was a contract option for more but the ICR fleet was the choice and CAF didn't help the case with the build quality issues on the Mk4, if the option was taken up the Tralee-Dublin direct would also be Mk4 operation

bk

There was a contract option for more but the ICR fleet was the choice and CAF didn't help the case with the build quality issues on the Mk4, if the option was taken up the Tralee-Dublin direct would also be Mk4 operation

Yes, I was thinking that might have been the case, that when the Mark 4's arrive, they weren't impressed and decided not to buy more.

The ICR's are better in many ways, but also slightly underwhelming for what are supposed to be the premier intercity routes.

trellheim

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121848520#Comment_121848520

Your answer only makes sense if the spare/reserve is used though !

Having a spare is not useful, if the spare is never pressed into service , its just coaches sitting in a siding , serving no-one.

If we accept that proviso, then why not run the spare in service, as I mentioned above with the next train only an hour behind, what does it matter ? Running it improves the service generally.

having the spare as a Mk4 is silly as well, a 22 can cover any failure at all not just Dublin-Cork so why isnt that the spare ,

this kind of discussion really only makes sense if one or more of the days' MK4 fleet happens to go down regularly enough to warrant a spare being kept. But that brings you back to my point above - why not run the spare anyway , next train is only an hour behind, clockface service.

I may be arguing in a void here, IE are very clear in the timetable recasts they dont want to go back to 7 in service but have never stated why.

The only other thing I can think of is as you mention, some possible maintenance need that means its not really a spare.

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121853016#Comment_121853016

Having a “hot spare” set is generally how railways operate.

You may not agree with it, but it is normal practice.

We could go on and on about it, but you’re not going to get seven sets back in daily use for the reasons I have explained several times now.

bikeman1

Also, for clarity, one set is only diagrammed to work 19:00 Heuston Cork.

So in reality there are just 5 sets in traffic each day. With that 6th set coming off exam if needed.

It’s 06:00, 07:00, 08:00 ex Heuston

05:40 and 07:00 ex Cork

The only train that should be ICR is the 21:00 which provided the set for the 06:15 express.

There is plenty of scope to fully utilise the Mk4 set throughout the day.

AngryLips

I'm struggling to understand how they ever expected to cover service to Cork, Tralee, Limerick AND Galway when placing the original order...

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121853653#Comment_121853653

I would have thought that would be rather obvious?

They were only going to cover certain trains on each route to allow Mark 3 sets cascade onto links operated by Mark 2 sets.

trellheim

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121853609#Comment_121853609

But thats even worse ! That means sets 6,7,8 ( and yes I know they rotate ) leaving more than a third of the fleet sitting about all with set 6 only doing 1 trip down.

Every Dublin-Cork I get ( and there's several- I hate it when its a 22 cos its jam city ) is rammed so why not run the absolute limit and free the 22s up to run on non-mk4 trips .

As mentioned above the fleet manager aint gonna turn up here and explain it, I get that but there is no open knowledge why its like this. Probably better to check the back pages of Modern Railways lol.

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121853609#Comment_121853609

For clarity though, you should also have pointed out the fact that this doesn’t apply every day of the week, with more workings happening from Friday to Sunday.

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121853817#Comment_121853817

I’ve given you the clearest possible explanation in the first line of the first post on this page. I don’t know what else you need?

trellheim

As far as I remember you don't work for IE ? Why should I take it as read.

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121853912#Comment_121853912

I don’t no, but I’d like to think that I have a reputation here of not posting false or “dud” information over the years in these forums.

Would it not occur to you that there are plenty of ways that people may informally find these sort of things out?

If you don’t want to believe what I post, or even acknowledge it when I do take the time to give you an answer, then that’s fine, as I won’t bother posting an answer to any more of your questions.

Citizen Six

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121853993#Comment_121853993

I thought maybe you did work for IE, given your knowledge. I appreciate the information in your posts.

RetroEncabulator

From what I gather, they likely intended them to just supplement the MK3 fleet and get rid of the oldest stuff i.e. Cravens and MK2.

The money was made available and they went for the big order of railcars / DMUs

dowlingm

The gossip of the time was that Sligo was supposed to be cascaded some of the 3s but someone protested against them getting hand me downs. Never proven, but it’s Ireland so couldn’t be ruled out either.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2055503161/mark-iii-carriages-why-are-they-withdrawn

the 3s were an odd fleet

the commuter push pulls had a DVT but no AC and were speedlimited

the Intercity’s had no push pull except for the oddball Cu Na Mara set, and no DVTs

Irish Rail didn’t like operating top and tail

A Mk3 set with AC, push pull, DVT and 100mph would have been… a Mk4 with decent ride quality.

bikeman1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121853817#Comment_121853817

That’s exactly my point. The “shortage” of sets is not really true. They can run more MkIV trains and cover the full service with the exception of the 21:00, but they don’t do that.

Also LXFlyer, the links are different on FSSu because there is no 06:00 ex Dublin and 06:15 ex Cork, and Sunday is virtually all MkIV, so it can be done, it’s just they don’t bother.

I accept that there should be a full maintenance spare (Set 8), but currently they have set 7 doing nothing and set 6 doing very little. There is scope to have one more on the circuit.

Even if that just does the 17:05 Tralee and back to free an ICR up, that would be an improvement.

Heuston, Cork, Mallow drivers sign the Mark IV and Tralee is a tiny depot of like 7 drivers, who could be trained up very quickly on them.

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121855516#Comment_121855516

The point is (and I’m not going to repeat this again) that there are no night time heavy exams in Inchicore.

Without that you won’t have any more sets in service. That presumably would require staff that don’t currently exist.

It all revolves around maintenance, but even with that I suspect that it would be unlikely that you’d get more than 6 sets in service on any one day.

And there is an 06:00 Heuston-Cork on Friday.

Glaceon

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121855335#Comment_121855335

The DVTs were a bit of a mess alright. No room for a full generator so they put in an underfloor one, hence the lack of AC. They also reused bogies from an 8100 DART which restricted them to 70 mph. I still have a photo of a test train they ran with Mk3s and Mk4s in the same set, presumably to show CAF a comparison of the ride quality of both.

LXFlyer

The gossip of the time was that Sligo was supposed to be cascaded some of the 3s but someone protested against them getting hand me downs. Never proven, but it’s Ireland so couldn’t be ruled out either.

It’s not gossip. Dick Fearn planned to switch the some Mark 3 sets onto the Sligo route, but some Sligo politicians objected, saying they wanted new stock.

So he complied and gave them 29000s!

It was one of the most stupid interventions by politicians.

trellheim

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121855578#Comment_121855578

Assuming this is true then the sets in maintenance are NOT SPARE, hot spare or otherwise . You can't have it both ways. Sets are either available or not. I was going to say there was an 0600 to Cork on Fridays as well but thats been posted.

But one of you must be wrong here.

If we take it there are 8 sets in total, and 5 in fleet service every day at least - hope no-one argues about those . Assuming further set 8 is in the shop - fine.

So during a duty day 0530-2359 or whatever, what are sets 6 and 7 actually doing . Where are they ? Is what is posted above true that set 6 only does 1 journey down ? Where is set 7 ?

bikeman1

I never said there was no 06:00 on Friday. I meant that on Friday the links are different because on Saturday and Sunday there are no early ones, which changes things slightly.

The sets are in Inchicore and Heuston. Have a look, you’ll see them lying about. There are even spare standards too.

The fact is there is one set available, that they don’t use. Allow for a maintenance spare, a day maintenance (comes out at 19:00) and three spare standards.

trellheim

And if that day maintenance came out at 1900 as you say , why can't it run the missing 20:00 Dublin-Cork ? in the other direction Nice 0645 departure crowd buster , and an 0900 arrival in heuston , and then fit to take its part in the line up