Can someone explain please how electricity costs are met by passenger TOCs? Are they even accounted for separately? And will be classes 93 and 99 now being built be more energy-efficient? And do Section 8 rail freight grants still exist? Presumably these are/were for capital expenditure only and not to help with things like electricity costs.
More likely that the 86s were nearly 60 years old, and starting to approach the condition commonly described as "knackered", and newer locos were available to replace them, as the 90s were no longer in use on London / Norwich services.
My apologies, I had not actually seen that before.
Whilst that is probably the case, I am only reporting what Freightliner said.
You can draw your own conclusions. Mine are that ever since EWS took over the 90s from BR they seems to have been in and out of store. Stored locos once they become cold and damp suffer electrical and electronic issues. The ex Anglia ones were in pretty much constant use by INTERCITY then Virgin then Anglia, so have seen considerably less storage.
The black ones (four I think) were refurbished for Grand Central to be used on the Blackpool - London service that was cancelled during covid and used instead by DB. 90021 was recently rebuilt and returned to use after a few years in store. Of the red ones 90035 and 90037 were in regular use until June
Thank you for your reply
uk.dbcargo.com
How easy will it be to get them out of Crewe Electric Depot? Are they more likely to be scrapped where they are currently located.
Should be ok if any prospective buyers are willing to take the rails they must be welded to with them
Spares to bring 90050 back from the grave...
Yes - there are plenty of services running diesel under wires today, and even FL now seem to have relegated their 90s mostly to Crewe-Mossend (whereas they previously ran frequently all the way from Ipswitch). Haven't seen a DRS 88 down south for a while either. So it seems like the electrics are only still being used where they are needed for timings over Shap/Beattock.
Of course, a freight train is fairly useless if it couldn't get into the actual yard, because the wires don't go that far (London Gateway looking at you, although Felixstowe also wouldn't need that much to allow stuff that runs via Wembley to go over to electric).
For Felixtowe, FL used to swap locos at Ipswitch but it seems this is no longer done and most are now diesel all the way to Crewe and beyond
Spot on. Loco swap adds 20-40 minutes into the schedule depending on location, potentially meaning you miss a path, and requires a shunt on site available to guide the driver in and then hook everything up. Also requires either the same driver to be capable of both traction or two drivers for one train, and a yard with enough capacity for the shunts. And then there's loco utilisation, it's very inefficient to have a 66 run just to Ipswich and then layover waiting for the next lecky hauled train in.
How about using spares from 048/049 to get 050 up and running? I’ll get my coat.
050 only needs a lick of paint and it will be fineHow about using spares from 048/049 to get 050 up and running? I’ll get my coat.
050 only needs a lick of paint and it will be fine
According to a Youtube video posted 4 hours ago 050 is to be removed by road and taken to an undisclosed location for cosmetic restoration.
I had exactly the same thoughts
Or another for the Heritage Centre? They certainly seem to have a good relationship with Freightliner
