Delays on the NEC this AM?

Today seemed like a normal day. The 6:57a at Metropark to New York arrived 2 minutes early as usual, and I miss it. (this train is almost the only train that runs early/on-time 99% of the time. dedicated crew?) So, I wait for the 7:10a. I sit down on the bench to work on some stuff, and I wait. Pretty soon, the platform fills up with 7:26a's passengers, as people were asking, "Does this train go to NY?"

At around 7:20a was the female announcement about the late 7:10a local to NY, but that was blurred out by the male AMTRAK Acela announcement (7:21a to Washington). The 7:10 finally arrives at 7:30a. As passengers crowd the doors, the conductor comes out and says "Local train". Some dismayed passengers step back. (However, if a local comes first, you take it because chances are it will get there faster than an express). That was my mistake and so I let the local go.

The 7:26a comes at 7:35, and the crowded passengers now board. The vestibules are more full than usual, and we anxiously wait to leave. However, when the doors closed, our end door went through a syncopated pattern of "bell.. close.. open.. bell.. close.. open". After the two to go was given, the train started to inch forward, but we stopped after the engineer said "End Door", as our end door continued that pattern for about 30 more times.

Funny, the passengers for the 7:39 thought that train was leaving early, so when they saw our crazy side door opening and closing, they formed a line to enter the train. One or two at a time was all that was needed to board about 20 more passengers from the 7:39! What an experience!

The problem is finally solved, and we aren't out of Metropark until 7:41a. And the conductor didn't reach us until past Elizabeth for our tickets.

1) Was it a minor setback today? What was the problem?

2) What causes one of the end doors to open and close repeatedly? I'm sure this confused the engineer with the door light going on and off.

3) How does the 6:57a keep such a good on-time rating? Oftentimes it comes early.

Well, I'll answer question #2 for you. The Arrow III doors and the A3s themselves are good equipment- but aren't maintained well by NJT. Here's a couple of door scenarios for you.

1) A door opens but when it opens all the way, it bounces back and forth about an inch worth every 2 seconds or so.

2) A door tries to close but gets stuck.

3) When a door opens, the bell will start ringing non-stop until the door recieves the close signal. So thus, the bell rings at all times when a door is open and when it is supposed to ring to warn that the door is closing it doesn't.

4) The door's bell doesn't work at all.

5) The scenario you described. The door closes, but doesn't "think" it is closed so it bounces back and tries again and tries again and tries again and so on.

As how to fix it? Sometimes reopening and closing the doors will fix it and sometimes you must give it the old heave. Sometimes even when it is closed and locked/disabled (because of not operating correctly) it still registers as open so the crew must go put the train in door the appropriate door bypass (end doors, center doors or both.)

For these and other Arrow 3 door malfunctions, visit your local NEC train station.

And incidentally, I'd probably be willing to bet money that NJT isn't going to rebuild the Arrow IIIs and is gonna keep on "bandaiding" them until they run them to the ground.

and they expect computers to run trains in the future?

they can't even have the computer detect a closed door

The arrow 3 doors luckily don't depend on computers. Otherwise I think we'd really be in trouble. If these trains were just well maintained, they'd operate much better.

The great things about the A3s is the doors open when you want them to (when working) and they open quick. The same is true for closing. The equipment is just in sorry shape. Door problems are becoming a regular occurence with them on the NEC.

I'm appreciating the Arrow IIIs, Comet Is, unrebuilt Comet IIs etc. much more now. Things operated a lot more simply on them. Computers aren't quite up to the task of competing with them yet.

The arrow 3 doors DO run thru the Trax computer system, as does everything else on the cars. But don't be so fast to smugly blame a faulty computer. Sometimes it's as simple as trash interfering with the sensitive edge, a trap that is slightly high or the door itself isn't centered properly. Any conductor will tell you that at Metropark, the lean of the train often causes a door to travel outside its track.

TR-00 wrote:The arrow 3 doors DO run thru the Trax computer system, as does everything else on the cars. But don't be so fast to smugly blame a faulty computer. Sometimes it's as simple as trash interfering with the sensitive edge, a trap that is slightly high or the door itself isn't centered properly.

Stand corrected. Learn something new each day. It seems then that the computers then on the A3s seem to operate pretty darn good (at least better than the ones on the C5s).

EDIT: How bout the C1s, C1Bs and unrebuilt C2s?

do the A3s have the computers in the center vestibule (the area behind the NJT service map) like in the C5s?

I don't want to give you any more dis-information tonight, but I think so. If you peak in through the little "vent" thing, you can see a computer panel- at least it looks like a computer panel. It seems to give information on the train status (speed, power etc.). The Comet Vs though have a nice little computer though. I've had the chance to see it opened up a few times. It's got a screen and all.

nick11a wrote:I don't want to give you any more dis-information tonight, but I think so. If you peak in through the little "vent" thing, you can see a computer panel- at least it looks like a computer panel. It seems to give information on the train status (speed, power etc.). The Comet Vs though have a nice little computer though. I've had the chance to see it opened up a few times. It's got a screen and all.

haha, how did you get the chance to open it?

Ahhh yes, the evil computer.

When in doubt, blame the computer.

I don't get this, automobiles for the last 20 years have been run by these evil computers, and they work just fine, as do aircraft and everything else.

Hey - I bet it's NOT the evil computer screwing up, but rather yet another case of 'garbage in / garbage out'. i.e., a sensor is having a bad day and telling the computer all sorts of silly things ("I'm open!" "I'm closed!" "I'm moving!" "No wait, I really AM open!" "Ha ha!! Fooled you, I'm really closed and you don't know it!"). Of course, if you don't have a good way of debouncing your inputs, or filtering the data or just trapping out silly data, you sometimes go in circles with all sorts of problems, but nothing makes sense. The computer goes through it's "look at the inputs, decide something, set the outputs" cycle, oh, maybe a hundred or so times a second. That jiggly wire on the sensor that causes the input to go 1-0-0-0-1-1-1-1-0-0-1-1-1-1-1-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-1-1-1-1-0-0-1.... Hey, that's what the culprit is...

jspsh wrote:

nick11a wrote:I don't want to give you any more dis-information tonight, but I think so. If you peak in through the little "vent" thing, you can see a computer panel- at least it looks like a computer panel. It seems to give information on the train status (speed, power etc.). The Comet Vs though have a nice little computer though. I've had the chance to see it opened up a few times. It's got a screen and all.

haha, how did you get the chance to open it?

A crowbar will do the trick. No, just kidding, it was open.

No one for the delay question?

F40 wrote:No one for the delay question?

There weren't any NEC delays later in the morning - I took the 8:22 out of Hamilton and we got in on time.

I've noticed on the AIIIs that when a set has door problems, it plagues the train throughout the whole trip, if not the whole day. The 7:10a at Metropark (#3818) is the first Trenton full local train of the morning.

If the set that was running 3818 was having door problems at each stop, it probably built up to the point where the next train down the line (the Metropark 7:26 train, express #3822) probably got stuck behind it at some point.

But the express train after the 7:10a local had door problems. Not the local train.

NJT has a customer notice on their website explaining the morning delays on the NEC on 8/4. Here's a link:
http://www.njtransit.com/sa_notice.jsp?ID=1141

I was on Clocker 622, which had to wait outside of Trenton Station for abut 20 minutes for the disabled train to be moved off of the corridor. It was weird because this train which usually boards on track #2 i think...boarded on track #1....there were a couple SEPTA trains that were also stuck on 2 until the disabled train was moved