Enterprise refurbishment comes closer?

end of the road

coaches will highly likely be scrapped i would say.

201s will probably survive until the mk4 are scrapped.

AngryLips

Is 8 trains enough for an hourly service?

Jamie2k9

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120048904#Comment_120048904

6 needed, 1 available, 1 on heavy maintiance/modification.

Charles Babbage

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120048511#Comment_120048511

I don't know much about the condition of carriages etc, but scrapping them in a country with perpetual shortages of rolling stock does not seem wise.

dowlingm

What do people here who have travelled on them think of the DDs? I know the lack of an DVGT like the Mark 4s has not stood to them, what with the issues with the 201s and having to build EGVs out of Mark 3s, but would it have been a good thing, had the money been available, were IE to have acquired some additional DD stock in 1997/8 - with own generation - on the same order, essentially the Mark 4 order but a decade early?

end of the road

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120051192#Comment_120051192

of course it isn't but that hasn't stopped them before and it won't again.

perpetual shortages are a big part of the UK style model we now follow, a hybrid of BR of the 1980s with a mix of the worst parts of privatization.

Charles Babbage

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120052387#Comment_120052387

It is never too late to desist from stupidity.

The Green party in particular have spent their time with Mickey Mouse cycle lanes, judged mainly by how much inconvenience they cause motorists, but have done little to increase the capacity of public transport.

end of the road

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120062860#Comment_120062860

i know it isn't but IE are wedded to that model and it is going to take brute force to change it.

the greens aren't the only ones guilty of failing public transport.

cycle lanes are a good thing if done properly for our towns and cities.

cgcsb

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120062860#Comment_120062860

I take exception to that. Our capital city has barely 10km of cycle lane that is usable, the effort made on improving cycling is close to 0. The remaining cycling 'infrastructure' is simply a FFG employment scheme for the makers of poles, digns and bollards and the results are of little use to cyclists. Even the liffey cycle route, a project that has been in the making for 13 years and cost about 10 million, has recently been shelved. If the state cannot deliver a mere 3km of cycle lane over a decade then the railways have little chance.

And by the way investing in cycling is just as important as public transport if not more so. Lots of cities have 40% of trips by bike and have healthier, happier populations as a result. Not that it's any relevance to the Dublin Belfadt rail service

Losty Dublin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120051192#Comment_120051192

And do what though? The sets are almost 30 years old, have a severely limited route clearance, they need locomotives to haul/push them, are costlier to run over over DUM's, are far less flexible than railcars and in the grand scheme of things, aren't really that practical. The issue nowadays is capacity as distinct to shortages of stock per se. The extra 41 extra intermediate units for the 22's will go a long way to addressing this. Meanwhile at least 39 new DART sets are on order along with a possibility of up to 250 sets. Once in traffic they will free up yet more DMU's for other services.

Glaceon

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120051500#Comment_120051500

I live in Drogheda and had a friend visit me from Dublin. She came up on the Enterprise and the first thing she said when she met me was "why is that train so much nicer than anything else on Irish Rail?"

They had their issues in earlier years, specifically around the lack of generators and also parking brake faults, but they seem fairly solid now.

NIR do pretty much all of the maintenance work on them so that could also make it impractical to redeploy them on other services.

Pete_Cavan

Another tender, this time for Rail Vehicle Advisory Services (which I would have thought was covered under the other recent tenders);

https://irl.eu-supply.com/ctm/Supplier/PublicPurchase/231450/1/0

Again, the documents are available to download without registering, says the contract for new trains is expected to be placed by Q4 2024.

1. DESCRIPTION OF THE CONTRACT BEING PROCURED

1.1 NAME OF CONTRACT AND SUMMARY OF SERVICES/GOODS REQUIRED/SUMMARY OF REQUIREMENTS This is a call to competition by Iarnród Éireann and Translink for the procurement of Professional Support for “Rail Fleet Advisory Services” (RFAS) to assist with procurement support, technical support, safety approvals, supply & quality assurance and testing & commissioning support of the new rail fleet. (the “Contract”).

The Enterprise Fleet Replacement Project (EFRP) is a joint venture project between Northern Ireland Railways (NIR) and Iarnród Éireann (IÉ). Both companies are responsible for the provision of passenger rail services, including the procurement and maintenance of rolling stock, within Northern Ireland & Republic of Ireland. It is intended to procure a new Enterprise fleet to operate hourly passenger services on the Belfast - Dublin railway. The EFRP team requires Professional Support for “Rail Fleet Advisory Services” (RFAS) to assist with procurement support, technical support, safety approvals, supply & quality assurance and testing & commissioning support of the new rail fleet.

While the train design has not been finalised it is anticipated that it will be initially specified to operate on existing 1.5 kV DC OHLE and have self-powered capability (diesel powerpack and batteries) to facilitate operation on non-electrified sections on the network. Once appropriate infrastructure is in place the train will be reconfigured with diesel traction equipment being removed and dual voltage equipment being installed to allow operation under 1.5kV DC and 25 kV AC OHLE and batteries for non-electrified sections.

The new train will be specified to provide a premium international intercity product with 1st class & standard class accommodation and a high-quality catering on-board.

A Professional Service Provider is required to deliver core services and optional services which may be drawn down as required. The term for Phase 1 core work is estimated to be 2 years with the contract for new trains is expected to be placed by Q4 2024. The term for Phase 2 Option 1 if exercised is estimated to be 6 years over years 2025, 2026, 2027, 2028, 2029 & 2030. The term for Phase 2 Option 2 is estimated to be 8 years over years 2023, 2024, 2025, 2026, 2027, 2028, 2029 & 2030.

Phase 1 is the time period from RFAS contract award to train supply contract award. Phase 2 means to the time period from train supply contract award to Fleet Acceptance”

cgcsb

It would be great of they came up with a technically reasonable plan to get enterprise trains from Drogheda to Dublin with a reasonably fast and reliable journey time. Also if they could shorten then endless journey between Newry and Belfast that'd be great. In my view the only real solution is to spend a bit of money and build new Dublin-Drogheda and Newry-Lisburn alignments but that's just me.

Citizen Six

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120067904#Comment_120067904

They break down fairly regularly.

Beta Ray Bill

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120132719#Comment_120132719

Interesting piece for me it this:

"allow operation under 1.5kV DC and 25 kV AC OHLE and batteries for non-electrified sections"

I'm not an engineer, but I do know that AC traction motors are far more reliable that DC ones. I get the DART fleet uses DC, but the bulk of the DART Fleet is near 40 years old at this point

Would they not just switch entirely to 25 kV AC OHLE?

Secondly.... batteries? Union Pacific, BNSF and others are in the process of testing batteries at the moment on steep grades to recoup braking energy, but apparently, it's not going well. (different application I suppose) I know brightline are using battery/diesel EMU's I think they're having issues too though.

The partial/mixing AC and DC bugs me though, with that kind of messing and bespoke locomotive/train requirements, you'd nearly be better off building a new line into Dublin at 4ft 8½in and leverage off the shelf EU type components such as the Siemens EuroSprinter.

Japan worked out it was cheaper to build new lines to upgrade old ones.

DoctorPan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120406352#Comment_120406352

If Irish Rail was to swap over wholesale to 25kV AC you've looking at completely scrapping the entire DART fleet, introduce a brand new fleet and commission it. They don't have the capital funding to completely replace the DART network and fleet. They do however to slowly transition into a dual electric fleet into a full 25kV AC fleet over time.

Dual voltage locos are common enough. The TRAXXX family from Alstrom is one current design that fits most of the requirements listed by IÉ/TL.

Beta Ray Bill

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120406584#Comment_120406584

I did not know that they were dual. Having read about it, it makes sense (Particularly for freight)

The initial phase of this though is 1.5Kv DC and Diesel though with a view to upgrade to 25 Kv AC later.

It still sounds extremely bespoke to me.

Like its 8 locos (Are they going Locos or EMU sets?) to cover roughly 200km of track.

Interestingly, the RFT has ended:

https://irl.eu-supply.com/ctm/Supplier/PublicPurchase/224670/1/0

I wonder how many tenders they got?

Beta Ray Bill

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120406584#Comment_120406584

I looked some more into this:

It looks like the Locos have Dual Pantographs (Two for DC, two for AC?)

That's a Czech Cargo loco that's expected to haul freight across different countries and Voltage types.

Very interesting.

Pete_Cavan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120132719#Comment_120132719

Tender reissued;

https://irl.eu-supply.com/ctm/Supplier/PublicPurchase/240425/1/0

Not sure what, if anything, has changed. Still says "The term for Phase 1 core work is estimated to be 2 years with the contract for new trains is expected to be placed by Q4 2024" despite Q4 2024 being less than 2 years away. Tenders to be returned late May so would be doing well to have appoint in June. Seems like a shitshow already.

dowlingm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120406352#Comment_120406352

The traction power does not dictate the traction motors. Even on trains with AC traction power there is usually a conversion to DC and back to AC within the locomotive as part of the stepping down to the voltage the AC motors use. For example, Amtrak used to have AEM-7 locomotives, some of which were in factory config (DC motors) and some refurbished with AC motors, under the same AC catenary

Beta Ray Bill

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120502345#Comment_120502345

I think the bespoke gauge/loading makes railway development very difficult.

I had a read through the original tender and it's a huge ask for just 8 locos.

I dunno what they're gonna do.

I think the manufacturers want orders from the likes of DB Cargo (250 Locos in the process of being replaced at the moment), very hard to attract someone to tender given our setup/size

Beta Ray Bill

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120510885#Comment_120510885

Ah yeah I understand that step down/conversion.

AC OHLE -> DC -> AC Motors

But can you go

DC OHLE -> AC Motors

?

or is the power not there?

Pete_Cavan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120513959#Comment_120513959

I'm sure what you say is true may be the reason why they had to reissue the tender.

In Jan 23, they issued the tender saying "Phase 1 core work is estimated to be 2 years with the contract for new trains is expected to be placed by Q4 2024". Even on tender issue day, it was 24 months to even the last day of Q4 2024. Obviously by the time the contract gets award, there will be less than 2 years so they had contradicted themselves already.

Then the tender gets issued again three months later with the same text. Tender return is end of May so by the time contract is awarded, there will likely be 18 months or less to end of Q4 2024. If they can't even set out a logical timeline at the second attempt or update dates to reflect the passing of time, I wouldn't have much faith in the technical aspects of the tender making sense in what is already a very bespoke specification.

Maybe some errors or contradictions were pointed out to them and that is the reason for the new tender. The process so far doesn't fill me with confidence that there will be a successful conclusion here.

andrewfaulk

You are aware that the link posted isn’t the tender for the rolling stock.. It’s the tender for consultants to advise Irish rail on placing the tender for the contract in 2024.. So based on that, would be 2027 or later before rolling stock hits the rails here..

There is also no mention of a loco and carriage set up, I would imagine what will arrive will be BEMUs, likely add an add or variant of the design IE and Alston are working on and have ordered variants of for the Dart

Pete_Cavan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120516149#Comment_120516149

Yes and it says the first phase work is estimated to take 2 years, then it states an expected date for conclusion of the first phase which is less than 2 years away.

The tender isn’t for consultants to advise Irish rail on placing the tender for the contract in 2024, the train supply contract is to be placed by end of 2024 therefore the tender will have to be isseued well before then. It also clearly states that they expect the work prior to awarding the train supply contract to take 2 years;

The term for Phase 1 core work is estimated to be 2 years with the contract for new trains is expected to be placed by Q4 2024.

...

Phase 1 is the time period from RFAS contract award to train supply contract award.

elevendroids

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120513974#Comment_120513974

Of course you can.

Here, a main diagram of a Siemens Vectron multisystem loco:

In German, but you should get the idea. When running under the DC OHLE, power bypasses the AC transformers and rectifiers, and directly feeds the motor inverters (which supply 3-phase, variable frequency AC to the motors).

As a side note, in Poland we have a bunch of old EN57 EMUs (manufactured between the 60s and the 90s) that got their propulsion upgraded from old-school DC motors (and resistive power control) to asynchronous AC ones (EN57AKM) - running on 3kV DC OHLE, as everything in PL:

A1ACo

In relation to above 3kv DC brief mention, I’d mentioned in the DART+ forum recently, that the ‘Prorail’ railway national infrastructure provider in the Netherlands had concluded, that upgrading (maybe not ‘removing and replacing’) their extensive, and in parts intensive, 1.5kv DC network, into 3 kv DC system, would be a more competitive and optimum solution for various improvements, than replacement and conversion of their system into 25kv AC. 

The 3k DC over 1.5kv DC improvements Prorail identified were, and would be of potential relevance I think,.. to Irish Rail, and a future Enterprise service (and DART services), if electrified to Drogheda (to 1.5kv DC), would be more scope for, with 3kv DC;

- up 20% energy running cost savings,

- higher speed potential,

- better acceleration.      

Regards small fleets of intercity trains, there were a number of small ETR fleets 20 years ago, for a number of countries, with single, or dual voltages, at 3kv DC and/or 25kv AC in Spain, Italy, Slovakia etc. (different track gauges as well I think i.e. Spain).

In Spain, their rail infrastructure national company, ADIF, has had a recent pilot programme, to upgrade some 3kv substations on a part of their network, to allow for better recapture of regenerative braking energy back into the catenary system.

It might also be of some note, that previous French, and Russian, research had also looked at Medium voltage DC (MVDC) (to 6-11kv etc.) upgrades to 1.5kv DC 3kv DC respectively, to bridge some of the gap to 25kv AC advantages, and also avoid some of the 25kv AC disadvantages).    

A1ACo

Also, I’m not sure Irish Rail’s track gauge/ loading gauge(s) combined uniqueness is particularly ‘unique’,.. as if you look at countries, even within Europe, you’ll see lots of variation in loading gauge, then catenary voltage, and also between the different track gauges combinations e.g. Spain’s, Finland, etc. broad gauges, and voltages and Japan narrow track gauges, etc..

Also, dual/ tri/-quad volt locomotives, and EMUs, have now been around for at least 20 years I’d say, particularly in Europe, for countries with two voltages e.g. France, Spain and Italy, and/ or crossing countries in later years e.g. the Benelux countries.

Small, ‘non-standard’ fleets have been procured before, and still seem to be in both Ireland, and abroad, so while all companies probably love big orders,.. big companies, or small ones, will likely be around to fill small/ ‘bespoke’ orders, as they have done for Irish Rail on most occasions (and often are just a variation on something already on their previous order books).

Anyway, even acquiring a variation on existing Irish Rail fleets, would seem to give lots of scope for a new any new Enterprise fleet, such as (in no particular order);

1.     More CAF Mark IV carriages (existing IE’s 160kph running, but 200kph capable) with existing 201 Class, or 201 upgraded to a Stadler Euro/Class 67/68/88/ Euro Dual II /Euro Light/ UKLight/AsiaLight, or Eurodual electric loco’ with diesel/ new Eurodual loco’s (various Eurodual combinations exist) (notwithstanding previous tender for 201 modernisation and re-engine apparently came back with one, very expensive response?).  

2.     22000/ICR (160kph existing) variation from Hyundai Rotem, with further variation from their Tokyu Car bogies.

3.     8500 series Tokyu Car (Now Japan East Engineering Company ‘J-TREC’) 'higher speed' variation, with further variation of the Tokyu Car bogies used for the later 22000 ICRs.

goingnowhere

The spec is quite clear

Needs to be hybrid at least for a period of time, it will need a diesel engine

1500v +25k AC operation

110mph

200m long

So basically you are looking at a variant of the UK IEP with 1500V support, IEP already playing with a battery in place of an engine https://railway-news.com/hitachi-and-eversholt-rail-to-develop-gwr-intercity-battery-hybrid-train/

Rules out the ICR platform without a massive rebuild

None of the dual platform locomotive will fit within the axle limits

Beta Ray Bill

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120545043#Comment_120545043

That's kind of what I took from it too.

There's just to much equipment for one Locomotive.

I'd imagine locomotive sets would be out of the question for this too.

IE Co'Co'+Co'Co' or 3×Bo'Bo', they use these type of loco sets for Ore in other parts of the world, but is it overkill?