Acela Express equipment shopped again

[Superliner Diner]

Yes bad news for potential Acela Express passengers, some trains have been cancelled for the following week. Some are outright cancelled, while others will have substitute Metroliner equipment. Some regular Metroliners have been merged with Regional trains so their equipment can sub for the Express.

The communication from Amtrak (sorry it's in caps) comes courtesy of Gene Poon from other internet sources:

ACELA EXPRESS SERVICE DISRUPTIONS

.

DUE TO MECHANICAL PROBLEMS, IT HAS BECOME NECESSARY TO CANCEL

A NUMBER OF ACELA EXPRESS SCHEDULES FOR 31MAR - 02APR03. IN

ADDITION, TWO ACELA EXPRESSES HAVE BEEN CONVERTED TO METRO-

LINERS WITH NO CHANGE IN TRAIN NUMBERS. THE DETAILS OF THE

CHANGES ARE OUTLINED BELOW:

.

*** ALL EFFECTIVE 31MAR03 - 02APR03 ***

.

ACELA EXPRESS TRAINS CANCELLED:

2157 -- PASSENGERS MOVED TO ACELA EXPRESS TRAIN 2159

2173 -- PASSENGERS MOVED TO ACELA EXPRESS TRAIN 2175

2150 -- PASSENGERS MOVED TO REGIONAL SERVICE TRAIN 170

2114 -- PASSENGERS MOVED TO THE CAROLINIAN, TRAIN 80.

.

REGIONAL SERVICE TRAINS CANCELLED:

133 -- PASSENGERS MOVED TO REGIONAL SERVICE TRAIN 93.

.

METROLINER SERVICE TRAINS CANCELLED:

122 -- PASSENGERS MOVED TO REGIONAL SERVICE TRAIN 196.

.

ACELA EXPRESS TRAINS CONVERTED TO METROLINER SERVICE TRAINS:

2107 -- PASSENGERS RE-BOOKED AS METROLINER SERVICE

2164 -- PASSENGERS TRAVELING BETWEEN ALL POINTS WAS THRU NYP

ARE RE-BOOKED AS METROLINER PASSENGERS; PASSENGERS

TRAVELING ALL POINTS NYP THRU BOS -- OR FROM WAS THRU

NYP TO ALL POINTS NYP THRU BOS -- ARE UNPROTECTED.

.

PLEASE NOTE: TRAIN 2164 WILL ONLY OPERATE WAS-NYP. REGIONAL

SERVICE TRAIN 142 WILL OPERATE ON THE SHORE LINE ROUTE. THE

UNPROTECTED PASSENGERS FROM 2164 MAY MOVE TO TRAIN 142.

.

ARROW HAS BEEN UPDATED TO REFLECT ALL OF THESE CHANGES (EXCEPT

TRAIN 142'S RE-ROUTE). THE CALL CENTER IS ATTEMPTING TO

CONTACT AFFECTED PASSENGERS.

-source: AMTRAK

 

[Superliner Diner]

From the Washington Post, 3/29/03:

Upkeep Problems Sideline 9 Acela RunsAmtrak canceled several runs of its high-speed Acela trains yesterday after inspectors found indications of substandard maintenance practices, officials of the passenger railroad corporation said.

The full story here.

 

[PRR 60]

Acela is pretty much a textbook example of how not to run a project. Acela was a year late getting to revenue service, has had chronic problems from that point forward, and now all parties are pointing fingers and fighting with each other. This latest fiasco is really sad. Remember, the rescheduling last fall cut the number of Acela trips to reduce the number of trainsets required for service and increase the reliability of the sets in service. Now Acela’s reliability is so poor that it cannot even support this reduced operation.

I would have expected that any developmental bugs associated with this new design would have been worked out by now. Amtrak has over two years of experience running these things. We should be entering the phase in the life of this equipment when things are really working well. Instead, there is one problem after another. The conclusion has to be that there are some serious generic issues with the design of the Acela trainsets.

I personally suspect the weight. These are exceptionally heavy trains for high-speed equipment. Comparing the weight of an Acela trainset to the TGV derivative sets in operation in Europe, only the Eurostar sets weigh more than Acela, and those trains have 18 passenger cars, two power cars, and carry 770 passengers each (compared to 6 cars and 301 passengers for each Acela set). Acela, at 550,000kg empty, weighs 45% more than an eight-car Paris Sud Est TGV set (383,000kg). That is a lot more weight and a lot more wear and tear on everything that holds it, moves it, and tries to stop it.

Train weight has everything to do with brake and shock absorber problems (the Acela defect de jour), and was a certainly contributing factor to the early and never quite resolved truck hunting problem. That problem in-turn necessitated the yaw dampers and brackets, which then cracked in-service causing last summer’s service melt-down. Part of the blame has to fall on Alston / Bombardier. I think they tried to force-fit European design elements to this extraordinarily heavy train, and the result is that things that in most cases are reliable, on Acela are causing problems. It is like trying to put a dump truck on a Porsche frame and drivetrain. It just has not worked out.

So, why is Acela so heavy? Thank the FRA and their “safety” requirements that effectively disqualified all the proven European designs and put all those extra tons of steel on Acela. It would have been interesting if David Gunn had been at the helm when the FRA forced Amtrak to discard the “off-the-shelf” equipment and re-invent the wheel with Acela. Somehow, with Mr. Gunn’s power of persuasion, I suspect the so-called safety issues would have been resolved and the NEC would have seen high-speed service years earlier and with much better and more competitive reliability. The sad truth is that if you need to get from Boston to New York on-time, the air shuttles are, by a wide margin, your best bet.

 

[AlanB]

I would have expected that any developmental bugs associated with this new design would have been worked out by now. Amtrak has over two years of experience running these things. We should be entering the phase in the life of this equipment when things are really working well.

PRR60,

From my understanding, in this case the problem is not development, but simply poor maintenance. Making this even worse is the fact that while Amtrak will get the black eye for this, it really is Bombardier's fault. Amtrak has a maintenance contract with them. It's Bombardier's responsibility to do the routine maintenance on the trains and apparently they haven't been doing that properly.

 

[battalion51]

I personally wish they would have gone with a proven high speed manufacturer, like Talgo, and allow he experts to do the project, rather than letting a company who has never attempted this type of project do it. If you look at Cascades Service in the Northwest they had FOUR trips cancelled all of last year, and this with no protect equipment, and someone was mad. The trainsets will continue to prove themselves for years to come, with the amenities and quality passengers expect.

 

[AlanB]

I personally wish they would have gone with a proven high speed manufacturer, like Talgo, and allow he experts to do the project, rather than letting a company who has never attempted this type of project do it. If you look at Cascades Service in the Northwest they had FOUR trips cancelled all of last year, and this with no protect equipment, and someone was mad. The trainsets will continue to prove themselves for years to come, with the amenities and quality passengers expect.

Battalion,

It's really not fair to compare the Talgo's to the Acela's, for several reasons.

One: The Talgo's don't meet FRA crash regulations, they have only been granted a waiver by the FRA. Therefore the Talgo's don't weigh what the Acela's weigh.

The weight of the equipment has a lot to do with the wear and tear on the equipment.

Second: The Talgo's at present don't operate at speeds over 79 MPH. They are working on boasting it to 90 MPH, but that has not happened yet. Now the Acela's on the other hand are capable of 150 MPH. Granted they don't run at that speed for long, but they do run a good portion of their journey at 125 MPH or higher.

So again the dynamics are vastly different. You put a lot more stress on your engines and cars at 125 MPH than you do at 79 MPH. Especially when you add the weight factor from above.

Third: Train frequencies are vastly different. There are only five runs in each direction for the Talgo's, for a total of 10 runs per day that must be covered. That means if all 5 sets are in service, that each train set must make one round trip per day. Additionally the longest run any one train makes is 310 miles.

The Acela's on the other hand have to cover 25 runs per day. Currently there are only 19 sets that have been accepted. Assuming that none are held in reserve and all are operational, that would still mean that 6 sets must make two trips. That however assumes that all sets are in service, something that we know doesn't happen.

Most sets are probably making at least two runs per day, if not more. The Acela's cover 457 miles for a run from Boston to DC. So again wear and tear is much higher for these trains.

Finally, as I mentioned in my reply to PRR60, in this case it's not a matter of bad equipment. It's a matter of Bombardier not performing proper maintenance on the equipment. That's not a design flaw. All equipment will fail if not given proper maintenance.

 

[PRR 60]

From my understanding, in this case the problem is not development, but simply poor maintenance.  Making this even worse is the fact that while Amtrak will get the black eye for this, it really is Bombardier's fault.  Amtrak has a maintenance contract with them.  It's Bombardier's responsibility to do the routine maintenance on the trains and apparently they haven't been doing that properly.

Although the direct cause of this problem is lack of maintenance, the underlying problem is far more complex and much more difficult to solve.

What has caused this crisis is that items are wearing and failing at a rate that far exceeded the experienced-based expectation of both Amtrak and Bombardier. This unexpected demand for maintenance is catching them short of both the parts and the labor to fix the defects. Going back to my automotive analogy, it would be like having a car that needs brakes and struts every 15,000 miles. You’ve owned cars since you were 20, know that struts normally last 100k, and brakes say 40k. But this car is much different. Now, say your Hertz and you have 5000 of these lemons on the street. Next thing you know you’re maintance shops are jammed with cars, and the parts rooms are out of brake pads and out of struts. You go to the supplier, and they’re out too. The end result is that the cars don’t get fixed, and your fleet is garaged. Inadequate maintenance is the reason for the problem, but it is not the cause.

That, I believe, is what’s happening with Acela. The generic design issues (weight?) are causing premature wear and tear failures and straining a parts supplychain that never anticipated this demand. The problem is further deepened by the fact that these are one-of-a-kind machines. The supply of parts and the ability to ramp-up part production is limited. So, although the superficial cause is inadequate maintenance, the root cause is a base design that requires excessive maintenance and parts replacement.

Sorting out the who, what, and why to determine liability will keep a gaggle of lawyers busy and rich.