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Alex Terrell · August 23rd 04, 10:51 PM posted to uk.transport.london

(Richard Catlow) wrote in message . com...
Alex Terrell wrote:

I pointed out that the Amtrak Metroliners had proved decades ago that
front doors weren't incompatible with high speeds, and they passed that
info on to the train manufacturers.

Yes indeed the Metroliners do have end corridor connections, but if I
recall correctly they are limited to 125 MPH.

Until the end of 2001 I was the head of Electrification & Plant for
Union Railways and was initmately involved in the development of the
CTRL domestic rolling stock specification. A few facts:

The units have to be 6 coaches long in order to prevent both
pantographs (1 per unit) from entering the long carrier wire neutral
setions. If they did, a phase to phase short circuit at 44kV would
result.

In order to maintain the required line capacity, the units were
specified to have a top speed of 140MPH (225 Km/h), with a high rate
of accelleration. The crashworthiness standards for stock of this
speed are very stringent unless you want to end up with the farce
applied to the like of pendolinos where the front half of each leading
vehicle cannot be used for passenger accommodation - a complete non
starter for a commuter train where bums on seats is paramount.

We consulted 7 rolling stock manufacturers over the crashworthiness
standards and end loadings and not one of them could satisfactorily
engineer the requisite stength with a central corridor connection.

So what's the outcome?

So for other posters on this thread - 16 train cars? Are you serious.
Which platforms could accommodate them (apart from the eurostar
platforms), certainly not rural station platforms unless they were
split to 2 x 8 cars. That's not in the spec, so don't expect that to
happen either!

Thanks for the info

Core stations are St Pancras, Stratford, Ebbsfleet, Ashford, and
possibly some on the North Kent line, so 16 cars is feasible with some
extension. I suppose the end result could be two 2 times 6 cars, which
might split at Ashford or Ebbsfleet.

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