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It's Yer Shocks Wot's Kaput, Mate
fbb has always been mesmerised by the technology of motor vehicles with his home maintenance being in the hands of a lump hammer, superglue or gaffer tape. He well remembers feeling just a little uneasy when a helpful mechanic shook his head in sadness and said, "I will have to send your head off to be planed!".
The problem with the Hitachi series of trains is that "cracks have appeared". The nervous will immediately expect their train to disintegrate progressively like a circus clown's car. But the more curious might read that the problem is with the train's yaw damper brackets.
It's Yer Shocks Wot Are Kaput, Mate
"Pitch" is bouncing up and down. You could say, simplistically, that you car's shock absorbers are "pitch dampers". If they are "Kaput" (other technical terms may be used to refer to their ineffectiveness) your car will emit frightening clunking sounds as the transmission collides violently with "the stops" and, if unchecked, other things will snap, possibly leading to lack of control and a nasty accident.
"Yaw" is the tendency to shuggle** from side to side. So modern train bogies have all sorts of clever stuff to ensure that they can bounce and wiggle - but not too much.
Pitch dampers are red and blue, Yaw dampers are yellow and there is an extra green damper to help with other lateral movement.
On Hitachi's 800 series of trains ...
In amongst models priced at £10 and over (plus postage) fbb spotted one at a model £3.99 (plus postage) which duly arrived at fbb mansions a few days later.
... it is NOT the yaw dampers themselves that have cracked up, but the brackets that hold the yaw dampers in place. (see "the leg bone's connected to the thigh bone" for concept). If the brackets break, the yaw damper won't damp which means the train could behave erratically at high speed and either collide with platforms or become derailed or both.
If the brackets are fracturing because of metal fatigue then there is a design or manufacturing fault which has to be rectified - possibly by designing stronger brackets, taking trains out of service and fitting them.
You can hear anguished managers screaming hysterically, "Get the HSTs back!"
"Whoops! Pish, tish and botheroo**, Scotrail have got some of them!"
"Have we got the coaches we took out to make the shortie Castles trains? Can we get or Pacers back to replace the Castles sets? Or maybe ..."
Who would run a railway, eh?
** Shuggle - a sort of jiggly twisting motion beloved of the Scots
** Pish etc - other expletives are available
And profuse apologies to any engineers who are reading this and cringing at fbb's explanations.
Logos And Liveries - Block 3
Stagecoach Magic Bus
First appeared during the loony post-deregulation competition in Glasgow ...
... and re-appeared for the loony competition along the Oxford Road in Manchester. Initial livery was plain blue, anonymous but with tasteful lettering.
This was followed by something more Stagecoach-like ...
... but still anonymous. The latest version is in the new (and awful) style but only using the wishy-washy blue. Sometimes the buses carry a tasteful "Magic Bus" label ...
... but always they admit their owner!
The brand has appeared elsewhere briefly and in a competitive environment, but if you want magic in your bus travel (?), Manchester is the place to be!
It's That Badger, Innit? Thamesway
Thamesway was a split from Eastern National ...
... and developed after the company was bought by Badgerline. The livery acquired the badger ...
... but not long aftterwards came the merger with Grampian and First Bus ...
... and soon all was Barbie!
Reading Buses Scarlet
With the arrival of gas powered buses, service 9, originally simply colour coded in red ...
became the "Scarlet". Reading, under James Freeman, was one of the first operators to take to the idea of colour coded routes - a precursor of todays more ambition route branding with names as well as colours.
Following this policy of consistency, the 9 is now the "Leopard 9" interworking with the "Leopard 8" via two different routes to Spencers Wood.
Just to keep everyone on target, the Leopard used to run to Wokingham as route 3!
Confused.com!!
Stagecoach Cross Pennine
Once upon a time, when fbb was much younger and somewhat slimmer (!!) the service between Newcastle and Carlisle was plain 685 operated jointly by Stagecoach and Arriva (but very much pre Max!).
But now, both operators share a common livery.
fbb is unsure how the partially liveried double deckers fit into the chummy scheme ...
There is nothing joint about the publicity with a tidy timetable leaflet "in brand" from Stagecoach ...
... which also shows the half hourly frequency from Brampton in to the Cumbrian "capital".
The Stagecoach web site insist there are FIVE services ...
... but in a non contentious outbreak of design stupidity, they do ALL lead to the same PDF timetable.
Later some simple route number branding appeared.
But Arriva simply doesn't deserve to get any specuative passengers for its awful web site and equally awful PDF timetable.
Salisbury Red Stonehenge Bus
And the above graphic only gets you as far as Hexham.
As the operator's name suggests, the bus is Green.
See also that other Salisbury Red bus, the Active8 ...
... which is blue. This route is joint with Stagecoach who have used moedifications to their standard livery ...
... thus presenting a clear united image to the potential bus passenger.
Confused.com!
Due to the intrusion of yaw damper brackets, the final set of answers will appear tomorrow.
Does The End Justify The Means?
Long-term readers (if there are any left!) will remember the sad tale of fbb's first such model ...
... which blew off Peterville's platform in a gale (Wizard of Oz style) and, unbeknown to the old man, lodged itself under the front wheel of the fbb limo. It was crushed to smithereens. Kind correspondent Peter provided a replacement. 
So it was that fbb prepared to start the process of adapting the model for lighting by opening out the bottom to allow installation of dividing walls.
He then changed his mind. The building was from an early run in red plastic (mid 1950s?). It will be re-purposed as the ticket office and toilet block for Peterville Castle, seen here taken out of storage and ready for Tri-ang heritage model to be installed. There it is, peeping through the trees at the foot of the entrance steps.
Later versions were moulded in a terra cotta brick-red colour.
NOW, fbb can begin the surgery ...
... to be continued ...
You have to admit that this blog always delivers tension and excitement.
Next Answers blog and more Variety : Monday 10th May
You can find proper timetables on the Arriva website, but you have to go to help -> coronavirus -> coronavirus timetables. Obvious eh!
ReplyDeleteReading Buses route 3 was the original leopard route and still runs under that branding. A branch off the 3 was created to serve new housing in Spencers Wood, as that grew it incorporated route 9 so leopard has now developed into its own mini-network.
ReplyDeleteI think that the problem with the suspension of the Class 800 trains was an earlier issue that was discovered last month:-
ReplyDeletehttps://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-56902528
The latest problem, that has caused the withdrawal from service of all of the Class 800 trains this weekend, is a different issue.The BBC report says:-
"Andrew Barr, CEO of Hitachi Rail, said the decision to withdraw the trains had been taken because of cracks found on the metal that linked the train's body with the underside of the train, known as the bogie."
Perhaps it was a better idea to build a prototype or two, and test them thoroughly before the production - but evidently, that's too expensive!
I think that the problem has only surfaced after many miles of running - no testing could show that. Hopefully they'll be able to work out how many hours.miles of running provoke the problem, and plan the maintenance regime accordingly.
ReplyDeleteThat depends on what you understand by "testing" Andrew! The German Railways "tested" their prototype class 120 electric locos for 5 years before ordering the production series, but that testing involved intensive service use.
ReplyDeleteHi great reeading your post
ReplyDelete