Passengers using South West Trains are to learn from a newly-launched £40 million upgrade of its Class 455 train fleet, that is already the foremost reliable within the UK.
The upgrade will deliver even greater reliability for services which operate at the Metro area from London Waterloo to Reading, the Hounslow loop and the Shepperton branch.
The 91 Class 455 trains, which can be already essentially the most reliable trains within the country, could be fitted with new traction equipment which promises to augment performance and improve reliability even further.
The programme – that allows you to be rolled out over the following three years – involves removing the prevailing DC traction equipment, including the motors, and replacing it with a good more reliable modern AC traction system.
Regenerative braking is the dominant consider the business case for brand new traction as projections show it’ll return over 20% of traction electricity on inner suburban services and around 10% on main line services. The recent traction units may also be lighter, reducing the quantity of wear at the rail infrastructure.
An added benefit of the brand new traction units is the increased mileage which might be performed between major servicing and upkeep works, with a purpose to increase from 10,000 to fifteen,000 miles. This would therefore mean that the category 455 trains will spend less time in Wimbledon depot and more time delivering services for passengers. an extended term good thing about this maintenance improvement will mean that space may be freed up at Wimbledon depot, enabling South West Trains to watch future capacity developments.
Over a better 20 months, South West Trains shall be introducing 100 more carriages onto its services to produce capacity for one more 23,000 peak-time passengers daily. Plans for developing long run capacity enhancements also are underway.
Christian Roth, Engineering Director for the South West Trains – Network Rail Alliance, said: “Our Class 455 trains are already by far the foremost reliable fleet within the country, however we aren’t complacent and we wish to make certain these excellent results are sustained and improved even further.
“The new traction motors should help us to enhance the reliability of those trains for our passengers similtaneously delivering environmental benefits throughout the reduced electricity supply.”
The prototype train would be fitted at Wimbledon depot with the rest of the fleet fitted at Eastleigh depot. The project ought to be finished by Spring 2014.
The investment is being delivered in partnership with the South West Trains-Network Rail Alliance, Porterbrook and the dep. for Transport.