My Trip to London 24/11/2007

[John_142]

Yes very interesting day and tiring too, To answer your question about the toilets i can say that From Birmingham to London it was Pendalino 390 004 and my seat was in Coach D and yes the toilet was in use.

From London to Crewe it was Pendalino 390 030 and my seat was in Coach B and again the toilet was in use but one thing i noticed about it is that it didnt seem to cope very well with the ammount of people using it as when close to crewe there was a terible smell from it alogh it was clean.

I did read not long ago in one of the Railway Magazeen that they had some problems with the toilets on the Pendalinos becasue of the quiality of the pipe worrk in to the septic tank in the roof ad this is were th waste goes on these i belive probably because some lines into London are third rail.

I shall be contacting Virgin Trains about this now that you have reminded me and see what they have to say about.

Iam still waiting to hear from Network Rail and Northern about the incident at Warrington as i do feel they owe me something for the upset and that i have aright to express my concerns etc.

[martin adamson]

I remember a few years ago that Virgin had to take some of the Pendolinos out of service, and it meant that some Virgin Trains Manchester-London services being ceased while the issues were sorted. Back when it was a mix of class 87 operated and 390 services, and one of the services that had to be stopped was the evening peak Virgin trains service non stop between London and Wilmslow, then to Manchester. This was all due to a toilet issue, so I wondered if it was the same reason and now Virgin have locked some out due to problems.

[Foghut]

Originally Posted by John_142

I did read not long ago in one of the Railway Magazeen that they had some problems with the toilets on the Pendalinos becasue of the quiality of the pipe worrk in to the septic tank in the roof ad this is were th waste goes on these i belive probably because some lines into London are third rail.

Yes I'd heard that there were problems with toilet waste fumes on Pendolinos, but I've never heard of putting a CET tank in the roof of a carriage before. Most Controlled Emission Tanks are underslung, because as in all sewer systems it's easiest to let gravity do the work, and also if there's a leak it will run away from the passenger compartment. Plenty of DC trains have their tanks below sole bar level...eg; 319, 465/6, 375/7.

[John_142]

Unless ive read it wrong and its the water tank thats the problem then again you knever know theese days.

Also with regrds to the toilet affter i used the one on the Voyager it seem to put its self out of order for some reason so looks like they have problems with the toilets on them to.

Think its silly how there are stil problems with toilets on trains in this day and age the problem, i think being that the desiners and manufatures don't use the trains.

The same goes for the seating on the Voyagers and Pendalinos as there didnt seem to be mutch padding on the seats plus they don't seem to be all that wide as iam a person of large build and yet i couldent quite fit into the seat with wise as leg space and space infront of me between me and the table was fine just not wide enogh.

Just glad i never had to sit next to anyone as would have been abit embarasing though not my fault this is were i was amazed at the seating on LU trains which were all very well paded and enogh room for me to be comfortable.

The seating on the Metropolitan Line Train was just like a 101 big wide padded seats clen and recently re-uploistered makes me think why other opertors do the same thing and Lok affter there trains like LU.

Especially with the Metropolitan Trains ("A" STOCK) being over 40 years old it appeared that they had been cared for well maintained clean tidy tiny bit of vandalisim but thats the way socity is these days.

When you ride on one of these "A" Stock trains when you use Merseyrail 507/8's on a daily basis you can deffintly see the difference in ride quality and Standard of Maintinece including Northern's Trains.