IE to lease UK fleet?

GM228 · 28-12-2018 2:16am #1

It's been mentioned in a few forums so best to have it's own at this stage as it is looking likely to happen.

Due to the fallout of the 2700 project and despite the approval of 41 new ICR centre cars IE and the NTA have approached various companies (predominantly in the UK) for the lease of rolling stock from mid/late 2019 onwards and seem have narrowed down their discussions to Porterbrook for 170s or Eversholt for 185s.

IE were looking for around 70 vehicles, Porterbrook have stated they can commit to 32 170s of various configurations and spec whilst Eversholt can commit to 66 185s which will all be of similar spec so I'm predicting it's going to be 185s.

Porterbrook and Angel also offered other fleets, but the above two seem to be the short-list. Watch this space.

man98 · 28-12-2018 2:28am

How quickly could a set be shipped, fitted with Irish safety equipment, regauged, and drivers be found and then trained on these sets? I presume maintenance will take a while to set up as well? Surely they can't be aiming to have these ready in 2019?

Stephen15 · 28-12-2018 2:31am

Regauge a few Pacers sure they'll be gone by 2019

GM228 · 28-12-2018 2:37am

man98 wrote: »

How quickly could a set be shipped, fitted with Irish safety equipment, regauged, and drivers be found and then trained on these sets? I presume maintenance will take a while to set up as well? Surely they can't be aiming to have these ready in 2019?

Once agreed, the leasing company will issue a tender for their re-gauge and fit out (most likely in the UK), this could take several months and would be the longest timeframe.

Fit out and re-gauging could be done in a fairly quick timeframe (only two or three weeks has been mentioned + another week for painting etc). Then ship the first sets over, test them and train all the drivers and maintenance over several weeks. As these are a proven train testing would not be required to the standard currently required for new stock, they could realistically be in service only a few weeks after delivery once they receive CRR certification, which again should be more straightforward as they are a proven train.

My understanding is they go off-lease in Q3 2019 so they most definitely could be in service by late 2019/early 2020.

GM228 · 28-12-2018 2:39am

Stephen15 wrote: »

Regauge a few Pacers sure they'll be gone by 2019

Angel offered 158 class 142 vehicles and Porterbrook 56 class 144 vehicles.

Most likely those fleets will be scrapped.

man98 · 28-12-2018 3:07am

GM228 wrote: »

Once agreed, the leasing company will issue a tender for their re-gauge and fit out (most likely in the UK), this could take several months and would be the longest timeframe.

Fit out and re-gauging could be done in a fairly quick timeframe (only two or three weeks has been mentioned + another week for painting etc). Then ship the first sets over, test them and train all the drivers and maintenance over several weeks. As these are a proven train testing would not be required to the standard currently required for new stock, they could realistically be in service only a few weeks after delivery once they receive CRR certification, which again should be more straightforward as they are a proven train.

My understanding is they go off-lease in Q3 2019 so they most definitely could be in service by late 2019/early 2020.

Ah ok that's rather interesting.
Would you have any idea what they'd be used for? Would be interested to see if they could be run from the Portlaoise depot on suburban runs, and move many of the 22ks over to Connolly services, I would imagine faster commuter trains to Drogheda/ Dundalk would mean that the Enterprise could run considerably faster too. It would also mean more consistent 22ks running to Sligo and Rosslare, as well as potentially introducing a 2 hourly service to Rosslare Harbour, which is a pipe dream of mine - luckily introduced on the Sligo line this month.

I presume they'd be a medium term solution to overcrowding? Is the longer term strategy to order hybrids/ electric trains to replace these, or to allow to live out their useful lives in Ireland?

devnull · 28-12-2018 12:28pm

GM228 wrote: »

It's been mentioned in a few forums so best to have it's own at this stage as it is looking likely to happen.

Due to the fallout of the 2700 project and despite the approval of 41 new ICR centre cars IE and the NTA have approached various companies (predominantly in the UK) for the lease of rolling stock from mid/late 2019 onwards and seem have narrowed down their discussions to Porterbrook for 170s or Eversholt for 185s.

IE were looking for around 70 vehicles, Porterbrook have stated they can commit to 32 170s of various configurations and spec whilst Eversholt can commit to 66 185s which will all be of similar spec so I'm predicting it's going to be 185s.

Porterbrook and Angel also offered other fleets, but the above two seem to be the short-list. Watch this space.

Considering the fact that there is a lot of delays with new rolling stock being procured in the UK at the moment I wouldn't be so sure that the 170 or 185 fleets would become available on time even in the unlikely event that they would be able to secure contracts for such rolling stock.

Whilst the new units coming into the UK will be electric stock or bi-mode, a fair bit of the UK stock due to be replaced cannot be used past 31st December 2019 and as such compliant diesel stock may well need to be kept on for a transitional period whilst the issues with the class 230/769 and the fairly big software problems on the Bombardier Aventra are worked out.

However there is talk in the industry that the UK will have to defer the 1st January 2020 accessibility deadline otherwise there will have to be quite significant cutbacks in peak time services from January 2020 as there will not be enough accessibility compliant rolling stock to provide an adequate level of capacity over the network.

The 185s would be excellent however - they're by far the most reliable modern Diesel unit in the UK, having won the Golden Spanner award fives times in the last 10 years including the last 3 years in a row, have recently had a substantial refurbishment and like all the Siemens Desiro range, have excellent build quality.

goingnowhere · 28-12-2018 12:42pm

185 are heavy gas guzzlers and share nothing in common with the existing fleet.

170 share the same basic MTU engine and transmission as the ICR's which makes a huge difference in supply chain and training. Much lighter. Likely cheaper lease. We also know Bombardier offered the 170 to IE before but Rotem won out, so likely someone has done some homework on regauging

Stephen15 · 28-12-2018 12:49pm

GM228 wrote: »

Angel offered 158 class 142 vehicles and Porterbrook 56 class 144 vehicles.

Most likely those fleets will be scrapped.

You do realise I was joking about the Pacers I think they would be the last trains we'd want to see on the Irish network anytime soon.

devnull · 28-12-2018 12:49pm

goingnowhere wrote: »

185 are heavy gas guzzlers and share nothing in common with the existing fleet.

170 share the same basic MTU engine and transmission as the ICR's which makes a huge difference in supply chain and training. Much lighter. Likely cheaper lease. We also know Bombardier offered the 170 to IE before but Rotem won out, so likely someone has done some homework on regauging

The 170s though are the most likely to have delayed availability on them, depending on where they are coming from, since some of the places where they are going to be freed up have delays on their incoming rolling stock and a batch of non PRM stock which has to be withdrawn, which means anything else is likely to have to fill the gap unless the UK defer the 2020 start date.

Also you're going to have the obvious situation with the 170s that they're all going to be varying interior specification and refurbishment and also some are going to be two car and some are going to be three car. I agree that the 170s are lighter on fuel and will probably be cheaper to lease, but that is also reflected in the build quality as well, the Desiro build quality has always been better than the 170 Turbostar quality.

Marcusm · 28-12-2018 11:05pm

goingnowhere wrote: »

185 are heavy gas guzzlers and share nothing in common with the existing fleet.

170 share the same basic MTU engine and transmission as the ICR's which makes a huge difference in supply chain and training. Much lighter. Likely cheaper lease. We also know Bombardier offered the 170 to IE before but Rotem won out, so likely someone has done some homework on regauging

The 185s were soec’d For trans pennies routes - lots of steep climbs and hilly bits. When they have been retasked, I suspect that they can be modded to improve efficiency on what will be much flatter routes.

GM228 · 28-12-2018 11:50pm

devnull wrote: »

Considering the fact that there is a lot of delays with new rolling stock being procured in the UK at the moment I wouldn't be so sure that the 170 or 185 fleets would become available on time even in the unlikely event that they would be able to secure contracts for such rolling stock.

Commitments have apparently been given regarding availability, but yes they are questionable.

devnull wrote: »

Whilst the new units coming into the UK will be electric stock or bi-mode

There are still a number of DMUs coming, namely the Class 195s and the unclassed DMUs for West Midlands.

GM228 · 28-12-2018 11:51pm

Stephen15 wrote: »

You do realise I was joking about the Pacers I think they would be the last trains we'd want to see on the Irish network anytime soon.

Indeed, just pointing out that they were offered (and of course rejected).

devnull · 29-12-2018 12:11am

GM228 wrote: »

There are still a number of DMUs coming, namely the Class 195s and the unclassed DMUs for West Midlands.

Yes - but the real problem is 1st January 2020 and operators having enough DDA approved stock because on that day a large number of DMU and EMU stock can no longer be used because they do not meet accessibility requirements and some of the replacement stock is running late and some interim solutions are going to have to be used unless the UK relaxes the DDA deadlines.

This is going to hit both the TOCs who are losing large amounts of rolling stock without adequate replacement in, as well as other TOCs who were depending on cascades from said TOCs that are now not likely to get them. The UK is more than covered for DMUs from late 2021 onwards, but there could well be a sticky 18 month period from the start of 2020 between the time a whole load of trains get barred under DDA and the delayed stock and new orders come on stream.

Look at Greater Anglia for instance - losing approx 150 carriages worth of 317s and 321s from 1st January 2020 and it's looking extremely unlikely Bombardier will have enough 720 units ready to replace all of them by the same time, judging by the chronic problems they're having with the Aventras for London Overground. That in turn may well result in Greater Anglia using bi-mode 755s as a stop-gap on commuter services, which means the DMUs that were supposed to be replaced by the 755s, will stay on for longer, which means they cannot be cascaded to operators who need them to replace their own DDA non-compliant stock.

There is no serious current DMU shortage in the UK and there is not going to be a medium or long term one because of all the orders and various bi-mode projects that will come on stream and start entering service. But there might be a temporary one from 1st January 2020 for a period of 18 months between these two things happening, but Transpennine Express don't seem as exposed to that at present as much as operators of the 170s are, so that should be good news for the availability of the 185s

end of the road · 29-12-2018 1:02am

i reccan the uk government will relax the DDA. it's not ideal but it's probably more politically acceptible then lots of bustitution.

devnull · 29-12-2018 1:22am

end of the road wrote: »

i reccan the uk government will relax the DDA. it's not ideal but it's probably more politically acceptible then lots of bustitution.

They will really have to, as if they don't there will be quite a few operators who are in the same boat of Greater Anglia, who are going to have a 12-18 month period between the old stock being DDA barred and enough new stock being in service or cascaded stock being available. The EMT HST DDA work is also apparently not going to be done in time for instance.

I have read a post on another forum though that some believe Labour might allow that to happen to point the fingers at the privatised railway and kill it off, although you have to say, making the public suffer in order to make a point like that would be a pretty big stroke to pull.

The reality is though, that it's probably going to come down to relaxing the regulations or mass cancellations since it's hard to see the multitude of other issues all being resolved that have led to that choice being necessary.

end of the road · 29-12-2018 2:28am

devnull wrote: »

They will really have to, as if they don't there will be quite a few operators who are in the same boat of Greater Anglia, who are going to have a 12-18 month period between the old stock being DDA barred and enough new stock being in service or cascaded stock being available. The EMT HST DDA work is also apparently not going to be done in time for instance.

I have read a post on another forum though that some believe Labour might allow that to happen to point the fingers at the privatised railway and kill it off, although you have to say, making the public suffer in order to make a point like that would be a pretty big stroke to pull.

The reality is though, that it's probably going to come down to relaxing the regulations or mass cancellations since it's hard to see the multitude of other issues all being resolved that have led to that choice being necessary.

agreed. what's worse about the whole thing is that dft knew this was coming and waited until the last minute effectively.
tbh the observation about labour isn't something that could be totally ruled out, after all both parties over there are capible of pulling strokes regardless of the consiquences to prove a point when it suits their agenda.

tabbey · 29-12-2018 11:55pm

devnull wrote: »

The 185s would be excellent however - they're by far the most reliable modern Diesel unit in the UK, having won the Golden Spanner award fives times in the last 10 years including the last 3 years in a row, have recently had a substantial refurbishment and like all the Siemens Desiro range, have excellent build quality.

The Siemens Desiro is indeed well-built and very reliable, but my perception of the 185 is probably coloured by standing on overcrowded 3 car sets on Trans Pennine services.
The seating is also not great for a mainline train, although I am impressed by the first class accommodation on the video.

devnull · 30-12-2018 12:10am

tabbey wrote: »

The Siemens Desiro is indeed well-built and very reliable, but my perception of the 185 is probably coloured by standing on overcrowded 3 car sets on Trans Pennine services.

Indeed, the overcrowding was a serious problem on the routes they operated on after a few years in operation, but a lot of that was down to the Department of Transport who cut the initial order of 56x 3 car units to 51x 3 car units and later prevented TPE from taking up an option to add a fourth car to said units.

Eventually in 2009 TPE managed to get the Department for Transport to order a batch of 200 new DMU carriages to resolve the capacity issues for themselves, First Great Western and Northern Rail, which was then later cancelled by the DFT following announcements of electrification.

The DFT then laughably came out and had a go at TPE for overcrowding, having spent the previous 6 years preventing TPE adding any capacity, by reducing train orders, preventing expansion of capacity on the basis that it would not be needed and giving them more services (Scotland) to operate whilst cancelling orders for rolling stock.

The seating is the same as on all the Suburban Desiro fleets, for me it's pretty comfortable but then again I'm tall and such seats are always better than some of the more classical designs.

SeanW · 31-12-2018 12:01am

Those Class 185s look nice

they would certainly be good for regional use, Intercity use in a pinch. Definitely an improvement over the 29000s.

But seeing as Irish Rail is planning to buy dual mode trains to replace the DARTs, would it not be a good idea to get a few more of them in an Intercity/Regional configuration (e.g. toilets, first class, luggage racks and so on). After all, within a few years, all of the approaches to Dublin will be electrified (from the North at Balbriggan, from the South at Greystones, from the North-West at Maynooth and the South West at Hazelhatch).
And no lease payments.

Stephen15 · 31-12-2018 12:09am

SeanW wrote: »

Those Class 185s look nice they would certainly be good for regional use, Intercity use in a pinch. Definitely an improvement over the 29000s.

But seeing as Irish Rail is planning to buy dual mode trains to replace the DARTs, would it not be a good idea to get a few more of them in an Intercity/Regional configuration (e.g. toilets, first class, luggage racks and so on). After all, within a few years, all of the approaches to Dublin will be electrified (from the North at Balbriggan, from the South at Greystones, from the North-West at Maynooth and the South West at Hazelhatch).
And no lease payments.

The 185s have all the features you mentioned

SeanW · 31-12-2018 12:13am

I was referring to the hybrids that IE were looking at, the trains that can use either diesel or electricity from overhead wires depending on whether electricity is available or not.

Discussed in another thread which I'll dig up shortly, IE wants these to replace the Gen 1 DARTs. Might it be a good idea to get regional flavours of these hybrids?

L1011 · 31-12-2018 12:15am

The dual-modes won't be here for five years realistically, probably longer. UK leased stock could start appearing within 12 months if the re-gauging was done quickly.

Also, they'll have toilets, luggage racks etc anyway

SeanW · 31-12-2018 12:33am

If it's to get trains quickly, that makes sense.

devnull · 31-12-2018 12:45am

L1011 wrote: »

The dual-modes won't be here for five years realistically, probably longer. UK leased stock could start appearing within 12 months if the re-gauging was done quickly.

Also, they'll have toilets, luggage racks etc anyway

Not going to happen anywhere near that quickly. According to what I've read the Class 185s are on lease to Transpennine Express until 31st December 2019, so I can't see any of them entering service in Irish Rail until near the middle of 2020 at the earliest to be honest. The good thing is that their replacement fleet is more or less running on time at the moment, so the leases will probably not have to be extended.

The Class 170s are said to be coming off lease two or three months earlier, but there is a strong chance that they will remain with their current operator for an extended period of time because of expected delays with other new stock and the resulting cascades and the upcoming DDA regulations coming in meaning the existing operators will need them.

EdgeCase · 31-12-2018 12:50am

Could Brexit complicate this as they'll be outside the EU after March. I could predict a few unforseen issues with leases, approvals and all sorts of things emerging.

GM228 · 31-12-2018 1:02pm

EdgeCase wrote: »

Could Brexit complicate this as they'll be outside the EU after March. I could predict a few unforseen issues with leases, approvals and all sorts of things emerging.

Other than possible lease related charges (taxs etc) I can't see any issues as they have already been type approved under EU regulation requirements and are registered on the EU vehicle database.

tabbey · 31-12-2018 5:14pm

SeanW wrote: »

within a few years, all of the approaches to Dublin will be electrified (from the North at Balbriggan, from the South at Greystones, from the North-West at Maynooth and the South West at Hazelhatch).

Within a few years?

We have been told that for decades. In reality, all that has happened is the cancellation of the interconnector / DART Underground.

EdgeCase · 31-12-2018 5:53pm

GM228 wrote: »

Other than possible lease related charges (taxs etc) I can't see any issues as they have already been type approved under EU regulation requirements and are registered on the EU vehicle database.

They'd have to be registered on any database via Irish Rail as the UK won't be able to do that anymore, particularly if they exit without any agreement.

I wouldn't be signing any infrastructure contracts with UK companies until after March and after the dust has settled as we have absolutely no idea of outcomes yet. It's all speculation.

GM228 · 02-01-2019 9:19pm

From Modern Railways magazine:

UK DMUs for IÉ

As a potential replacement for the 2700 Class units, which will remain out of use, IÉ has confirmed to Modern Railways that it is also currently discussing leasing (and re-gauging to 1,600mm) UK Class 170 or 185 DMUs with UK ROSCOs, which anticipate having these vehicles available in the near future. The IÉ board has decided not to purchase any more 'pure diesel' trains, so in future new stock will be electric or hybrid (or battery).

Jamie2k9 · 02-01-2019 9:37pm

Call me a cynic but I am not convinced leasing a fleet will ever happen particularly given the relatively short period they are required for. They will need to bite the bullet and get 2700s going in Limerick short term.

IE to lease UK fleet?

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