Merseyrail Class 777 introduction updates

[Mat17]

The other big difference between the 507 and the 777 is that the passengers have to get used to opening the doors. There are still lots of people that stand there and wonder why they aren't opening.

Isn't that normal though? I thought all trains had doors where you need to push a button to open them (or turn a handle, if going back a few years).

 

[nigelsporne]

With regard to the pickup shoes issue is this a mechanical problem or a software one? If each coach has a pickup each side why do you need to higher and lower them? Can the pickups be independently operated on each side? Is it a wear and tear issue? Are the 507s the same?

 

[urbophile]

Isn't that normal though? I thought all trains had doors where you need to push a button to open them (or turn a handle, if going back a few years).

It's not been normal on Merseyrail. Just like London Underground, the doors were all remotely controlled by the guard or driver. Was that also true of the 502/3s?

 

[Bertie the bus]

Much has been said in this thread about the problems with the introduction of the 777s. From an outsider there appears to be problems on the manufacturing side as well as a political angle. The only way to get the Mayor to listen I suspect is if there are votes at stake. There have been many valid criticisms expressed but have any of these been aired in the local press? Is it time for a choice letter or two to try and stir things up? Perhaps a local reporter might pick up on the story and the people of Liverpool start to get some answers and hopefully a resolution.

What do you expect the Mayor to do at this stage? Some poorly tested units with a myriad of faults have been introduced and the old trains they have replaced have been sent to the scrap yard. The Mayor can huff and puff all he likes but I doubt Stadler are going to do anything beyond what is stated in the contract.

 

[prod_pep]

It's not been normal on Merseyrail. Just like London Underground, the doors were all remotely controlled by the guard or driver. Was that also true of the 502/3s?

The 503s originally had passenger door controls but the 502s did not, although in practice the function was only used at the quietest stations. The 503's doors became entirely guard-operated in the early 1960s.

 

[RichardAsh1981]

With regard to the pickup shoes issue is this a mechanical problem or a software one? If each coach has a pickup each side why do you need to higher and lower them? Can the pickups be independently operated on each side? Is it a wear and tear issue? Are the 507s the same?

I don't know about this problem, but a 507 has two shoes each side (one on each motor coach), fixed so they can't be retracted. 777 has four shoes per side, I think on the outer two bogies of each half.

I presume that retractable shoes are in the spec to meet the loading gauge when running on overhead or batteries - the third rail is outside loading gauge so by definition operating shoe gear fouls non-third rail loading gauge.

Why they would be retracted at Hunts Cross I don't know, as far as I know both sides stay out when on third rail because the rail swaps side without notice.

 

[baldyman26]

The Mayor is safe, the labour council is safe, he knows it hence why he can slope the blame on everyone but himself. Stadler will get their money for trains delivered, the people who will suffer are the commuters. This whole roll out has been an utter disgrace yet the very people responsible can hide knowing they are untouchable. Isn't it funny how many moons ago we had a certain Mr Powell on here patting himself on the back, he's crawled back into the woodwork. I think this whole thing needs to go to public enquiry, it's our money that has bought them after all. All too often politicians get away with murder, its happening again here.

 

[childwallblues]

The Mayor is safe, the labour council is safe, he knows it hence why he can slope the blame on everyone but himself. Stadler will get their money for trains delivered, the people who will suffer are the commuters. This whole roll out has been an utter disgrace yet the very people responsible can hide knowing they are untouchable. Isn't it funny how many moons ago we had a certain Mr Powell on here patting himself on the back, he's crawled back into the woodwork. I think this wh ole thing needs to go to public enquiry, it's our money that has bought them after all. All too often politicians get away with murder, its happening again here.

Spot on baldyman26. The Mayors next big project is bus franchising. we locals are in for a hammering.

 

[prod_pep]

777015 also failed earlier on the West Kirby line's only 777 diagram. It has been replaced by 777036.

 

[Sam 76]

Spot on baldyman26. The Mayors next big project is bus franchising. we locals are in for a hammering.

Not to mention those hydrogen buses !! Couldn’t have just chosen electrics with easy facilities could they

 

[prod_pep]

Isn't it funny how many moons ago we had a certain Mr Powell on here patting himself on the back, he's crawled back into the woodwork.

His crowing on Twitter is also suddenly conspicuous by its absence.

I think your post says it all, and says it well.

 

[M28361M]

5T98 on OpenTrainTimes maps heading towards Hunts Cross now. Is this a rescue unit for the failed 777?

 

[greeny11]

Out of interest, are there any particularly troublesome 777s and any which are more reliable, or is it more of a whole fleet issue with reliability?

 

[childwallblues]

Out of interest, are there any particularly troublesome 777s and any which are more reliable, or is it more of a whole fleet issue with reliability?

Merseyrail tend to send those in service the longest to the Wirral whilst the later ones are on the Ormskirks. But of course any unit can turn up on any line.
On Southport trains recently I have had 007 and 004.

 

[anthony263]

Spot on baldyman26. The Mayors next big project is bus franchising. we locals are in for a hammering.

Oh believe me if its anything like the current bus retendering exercise here in wales run.

Let's just say April 1st theres a big shock and shake up . Us drivers know whats coming sadly we limited what we can say

 

[Prime586]

With regard to the pickup shoes issue is this a mechanical problem or a software one? If each coach has a pickup each side why do you need to higher and lower them? Can the pickups be independently operated on each side? Is it a wear and tear issue? Are the 507s the same?

AFAIK, the Class 507/508s have fixed pick up shoes on the gangway end bogies of each of the DM coaches (they otiginally had shoes on both bogies, but the cab end bogie shoes were removed due to rough running/arcing in 1992/93)

Why they would be retracted at Hunts Cross I don't know, as far as I know both sides stay out when on third rail because the rail swaps side without notice.

From what was reported by @L401CJF, the issue with the unit near the junction outside Parkway was that there was a Driver Safety Device failure which caused the pickup shoes to be raised, and they could not be lowered even after the unit was reset. Either activating the DSD on a 777 raises the shoes as well as applying the emergency brakes, or the techs who came to try and sort out the DSD issue somehow raised the shoes in the process and got them into a state where the train management system couldn't put them down, even after the unit was put through a full reset.

it could be an issue with the state machine in the Train Management System software that controls the pickups. It's possible that if they were raised by a 'non normal' action (i,e, not through a command from the TMS) that the state data can go out of sync with their physical position.

 

[karlbbb]

AFAIK, the Class 507/508s have fixed pick up shoes on the gangway end bogies of each of the DM coaches (they otiginally had shoes on both bogies, but the cab end bogie shoes were removed due to rough running/arcing in 1992/93)

From what was reported by @L401CJF, the issue with the unit near the junction outside Parkway was that there was a Driver Safety Device failure which caused the pickup shoes to be raised, and they could not be lowered even after the unit was reset. Either activating the DSD on a 777 raises the shoes as well as applying the emergency brakes, or the techs who came to try and sort out the DSD issue somehow raised the shoes in the process and got them into a state where the train management system couldn't put them down, even after the unit was put through a full reset.

it could be an issue with the state machine in the Train Management System software that controls the pickups. It's possible that if they were raised by a 'non normal' action (i,e, not through a command from the TMS) that the state data can go out of sync with their physical position.

As I recall, there's a couple of units which drop their panto under emergency braking. The only one that springs to mind is the Siemens Vectron units, but under (the German equivalent of) DSD or emergency brake applications it drops the panto and uses friction brakes only, so it could be that the 777 is similar. Not sure of the rationale if you consider you can just gravity-drop a panto, compared to the effort required to raise shoes.

 

[The_Train]

5T98 on OpenTrainTimes maps heading towards Hunts Cross now. Is this a rescue unit for the failed 777?

I watched a service train head into P3 at Hunts Cross at about 9pm last night as I was wondering if the unit was still there. Presumably the failed unit moved earlier in the day

Edit: When I say "watched", I mean on the maps

 

[DanNCL]

I presume the delivery schedule was baked-in to the contract, as Stadler don't have extensive storage facilites near their factories so they need to clear what storage they do have for other customer's units that are coming off the line.

It was probably based on the assumption that there would be minimal issues post-delivery and introduction, which would have allowed the withdrawal of the 507 & 508 fleets to be accelerated. Instead, they have needed to be kept to the end of their leases, which has meant there is not enough room for the units being delivered at the depots so they were being kept at Walton and are now going to Long Marston. All of this was presumably exacerbated by the delayed introduction into service due to COVID and not sorting out the agreements with the unions about how they would be operated ahead of time (that really should have been done during the specification stage, not after units had started to be delivered).

It's interesting to see that Nexus have already postponed the introduction of the 555s until at least next year, after unspecified issues were found during testing on the Metro network. I think they own their existing Metrocar fleet though, so they are not in the same position as Merseyrail who, stuck between a rock and a hard place, seem to have made the choice to soldier on with the introduction of unreliable units rather than having to pay for extending the lease on the existing stock and potentially put them through deep maintanance (it's arguable that the contract with Stadler could have been written so that they bore those costs if the introduction of the new fleet did not go as planned).

As I said earlier in the thread, I think a lot of these issues are due to Merseytravel having no previous experience in the aspects of procuring, testing and introducing a new fleet. In my line of work, post-delivery faults of the scale seen with the 777s would cause the programme to be halted and there would be contracted daily penalty payments to the customer until solutions were available (which is a great incentive to get as much testing, based on real-world use cases and conditions, done as possible pre-delivery).

The issues with the 555s are traction issues when rail adhesion is poor. The 555s have a different traction package from the 777s.

Nexus are also stuck between a rock and hard place although their situation is different. They own their old fleet outright but their old fleet is on its last legs and what’s left of it won’t work much longer - a third of it is already condemned with faults too major to fix and that number is ever growing. Can’t remember the exact MTIN figure for the Metrocars but it’s comparable to that of the 777s, it’s dire.
With Merseyrail whilst the 507s are leased, the 507s are capable of soldiering on a bit longer and Angel Trains know they can’t lease the 507s to anyone else so are unlikely to be against a lease extension.

Stadler have filled up their storage space at the St Margrethen site with completed 555s that now can’t be delivered to Gosforth. There might be the odd 777 with them but the yard mostly has 555s.

I'm not privvy to the details of the contract but if they don't work it would be absurd if Merseyrail were not able to halt deliveries. What Stadler does with the undelivered sets is not Merseyrail's problem. I'd like to think that they don't pay lease charges until a set has been accepted to traffic. Assuming no major overhauls due, the owner of the 507s is likely to be happy to offer a reasonable week by week extension rate. It's virtually money for nothing.

Merseyrail can refuse to accept new units for service but as Kirkdale is now a Stadler site there’s nothing Merseyrail can do to stop further deliveries to Kirkdale.

Nexus have managed to stop deliveries to Gosforth as whilst the site itself is Stadler, it can only be accessed via Nexus track so Nexus can refuse transit. Merseyrail don’t have that option for Kirkdale as they don’t own the track.

 

[karlbbb]

A question that is best to ask here but I'm guessing may not be able to be answered publicly - there's currently signalling issues between Moorfields and Sandhills with trains having to crawl up to ML39 (on the incline out of Moorfields), stop, and then pass through at red. The last two I've watched have passed through and then immediately stopped. I was under the belief that the "override" on TPWS would let you continue without it tripping the emergency brakes but that doesn't seem to be the case. Is this so, or is it perhaps a Merseyrail SOP to pass and then stop manually again?

 

[L401CJF]

A question that is best to ask here but I'm guessing may not be able to be answered publicly - there's currently signalling issues between Moorfields and Sandhills with trains having to crawl up to ML39 (on the incline out of Moorfields), stop, and then pass through at red. The last two I've watched have passed through and then immediately stopped. I was under the belief that the "override" on TPWS would let you continue without it tripping the emergency brakes but that doesn't seem to be the case. Is this so, or is it perhaps a Merseyrail SOP to pass and then stop manually again?

When authorised to pass a signal at danger in the underground sections it'll trigger the tripcock/trainstop, emergency brake will apply and the driver then has to reset it.

 

[karlbbb]

When authorised to pass a signal at danger in the underground sections it'll trigger the tripcock/trainstop, emergency brake will apply and the driver then has to reset it.

ML39 is the first signal out of Leeds Street tunnels.

 

[L401CJF]

ML39 is the first signal out of Leeds Street tunnels.

Ah I know the one! In that case, no idea!

 

[TheSel]

VERY limited service now running in both directions on the Up, e.g. 2S31 and 2S33.

 

[karlbbb]

It seems signals ML39 and ML49 are the culprits. ML39 currently keeps getting passed at danger and earlier the same with ML49. A route was able to be set from ML51 onwards - at least, this is what was shown/reported on RailCam and OTT.

 

[Skie]

NR have had a bad few weeks on Merseyrail. Perfect time to do it whilst unit reliability is poor

 

[47444]

Updated List since movements to Long Marston today:
Kirkdale C.S. = 001 to 028 inclusive, 030, 031, 032, 034, 036, 049, 140, 142, 144, 146, 148, 150 and 152.

Is it possible to confirm how many of the "Kirkdale" units are yet to enter passenger service?

I believe it is 021, 027, 032 and 034 - is that right?

TIA

 

[DJH1971]

Is it possible to confirm how many of the "Kirkdale" units are yet to enter passenger service?

I believe it is 021, 027, 032 and 034 - is that right?

TIA

And 029, or is that for Birkenhead North?

 

[Tramfan]

The issues with the 555s are traction issues when rail adhesion is poor. The 555s have a different traction package from the 777s.

Nexus are also stuck between a rock and hard place although their situation is different. They own their old fleet outright but their old fleet is on its last legs and what’s left of it won’t work much longer - a third of it is already condemned with faults too major to fix and that number is ever growing. Can’t remember the exact MTIN figure for the Metrocars but it’s comparable to that of the 777s, it’s dire.
With Merseyrail whilst the 507s are leased, the 507s are capable of soldiering on a bit longer and Angel Trains know they can’t lease the 507s to anyone else so are unlikely to be against a lease extension.

Stadler have filled up their storage space at the St Margrethen site with completed 555s that now can’t be delivered to Gosforth. There might be the odd 777 with them but the yard mostly has 555s.


Merseyrail can refuse to accept new units for service but as Kirkdale is now a Stadler site there’s nothing Merseyrail can do to stop further deliveries to Kirkdale.

Nexus have managed to stop deliveries to Gosforth as whilst the site itself is Stadler, it can only be accessed via Nexus track so Nexus can refuse transit. Merseyrail don’t have that option for Kirkdale as they don’t own the track.

It's not as different a situation between the two, a lot of the stopped Tyne & Wear Metrocars are stopped because they require heavy maintenance and because of a lack of spare parts, rather than faults as such, which I think is similar to how Merseyrail have chosen the order in which sets are disposed of?

I don't know what the current MTIN figure for the Metrocars is, but fairly recently I believe it was something like 4,000km

 

[childwallblues]

And 029, or is that for Birkenhead North?

029 is in store at Long Marston is it not?
?