All Things WMATA 7000 Series

"jackintosh11"
What we're talking about here is when the 7000 series becomes the largest fleet size in Metro's history.

If you go by manufacture and not by series then the number becomes 467 as all of the cars manufacture by Breda totaled 466.

Sand Box John wrote:"JDC"
This morning I road a 7000-series train on Green line that included car 7255. So we're just 54 cars away from the magical (or at least magical in my mind) 7300.

Actually the magical number is 7299 as the 300 1k cars were numbered from 1000 > 1299. If you include the 64 cars for phase I of the Silver line the magical number becomes 7363.

I like John's 7363, since that factors in 64 cars for phase I and is really when we're talking about 1k car replacement being 1 for 1.

Feel free to celebrate both milestones.

Apparently there is a claim that the 7k cars are too heavy and nosy:

http://wamu.org/story/17/01/09/metro-in ... reen-line/

I thought the weight increase wasn't all that much more than the older fleet. Why so much earth shaking noise from these cars?

I notice this when they roll into stations but not ALL the time. Sometimes they approach just as quietly (or close) as the older fleet.

"Chris Brown"
Apparently there is a claim that the 7k cars are too heavy and nosy:

http://wamu.org/story/17/01/09/metro-in ... reen-line/

I thought the weight increase wasn't all that much more than the older fleet. Why so much earth shaking noise from these cars?

I notice this when they roll into stations but not ALL the time. Sometimes they approach just as quietly (or close) as the older fleet.

The question I have is, where exactly is this vibration being felt? The interlocking west of the Georgia Avenue Petworth station is on a floating slab. Floating slabs do a pretty dam good job of preventing vibrations from being felt outside the tunnel envelope. If Memory serves the bottom of NATM tunnels on both sides station pass through the top 6" to 24" of the bedrock at various points.

Just an anecdote, for what it's worth. Waiting at Dupont Circe at 4 PM yesterday, the PIDS showed 8 car trains for the next 6 arrivals (3 on each side). My train arrived first, and it was a 7000-series train. As I traveled towards Gallery Place, I observed that each of the next 5 trains heading towards Shady Grove were all 7000-series. So, in a matter of maybe 10 minutes I saw 6 7000-series trains all back to back. Do we have any idea whether the Red line at rush hour is approaching 50% 7000-series (and thus 8-car) trains at rush hour? It would make sense in that Metro is committed to decommissioning the 1ks, which make up a large proportion of the rolling stock on the Red line.

^Not sure, but there are definitely a lot on the Red line. My office is near NoMa where I can actually see the Redline from my window. I can see every train that goes by if I pay attention. It definitely seems like at least half the red line is 7k trains during the week. However, it seems to change from day to day. Some days I see more than others.

But the Red line definitely has more 7k's than any other line. I've seen two of them on the Silver line within the last month which was a surprise. By now Metro probably has around 270 of them. We'll probably get to car 7300 by March.

Based on the speed of acceptance, is the commissioning test track finally operating?

The test track went "operational" around March of 2016. WMATA's trying to get acceptance testing on the new cars down from 3 weeks to 2 weeks at the moment.

srepetsk wrote:The test track went "operational" around March of 2016. WMATA's trying to get acceptance testing on the new cars down from 3 weeks to 2 weeks at the moment.

If all the new cars are exact replicas of each other.. why is so much testing needed?

They are all exact copies!! I would think 1 week of testing would do at this point.

Chris Brown wrote:If all the new cars are exact replicas of each other.. why is so much testing needed?

They are all exact copies!! I would think 1 week of testing would do at this point.

They're not. There's always variances in all the parts. Plus, they're not 100% robo-built, so you got variances there. Even though it's slight, there's enough variance in total that you basically got to test all the equipment (I won't be surprised if FRA mandates it).

Plus, they're slow in building those suckers anyway. What's an extra two weeks to make sure nothing was assembled incorrectly while under simulated load?

"Chris Brown"
If all the new cars are exact replicas of each other.. why is so much testing needed?

They are all exact copies!! I would think 1 week of testing would do at this point.

For the same reason why automobile manufactures test cars after they come off the assembly line. To verify fit and finish, to verify that all of the various subsystems are correctly connected to each other, to verify that all the software for the various subsystems is correctly functioning, and to verify that all the various subsystems and can talk to each other.

Back in the 1960 I went on a tour of the General Motors BOP (Buick, Oldsmobile, Pontiac) plant in Fairfax Kansas. One of the Oldsmobile sedans was off to the side at the end of the assembly line because the wheels were mounted on the hubs backwards.

It looks like there's some serious vibration problems on the green line with the new trains. Would banning the 7Ks on the green line work for the time being?

I gotta say the vibration and noise are noticeable on the 7Ks, reminds me of the loud ass trains they run on the seoul subway system

Chris Brown wrote:^Not sure, but there are definitely a lot on the Red line. My office is near NoMa where I can actually see the Redline from my window. I can see every train that goes by if I pay attention. It definitely seems like at least half the red line is 7k trains during the week. However, it seems to change from day to day. Some days I see more than others.

But the Red line definitely has more 7k's than any other line. I've seen two of them on the Silver line within the last month which was a surprise. By now Metro probably has around 270 of them. We'll probably get to car 7300 by March.

^This. The 7K's dominate on the Red Line though. It's almost a given that an 8-car train is 7K, but I agree, it changes on a day to day basis.

YOLO wrote:It looks like there's some serious vibration problems on the green line with the new trains. Would banning the 7Ks on the green line work for the time being?

I gotta say the vibration and noise are noticeable on the 7Ks, reminds me of the loud ass trains they run on the seoul subway system

I think my first reaction when they first started appearing on the Red Line was how loud and heavy they were. Even back then it was very easy to tell if one was approaching the station. It makes them even more like the NYCT rolling stock.

Unfortunately I don't see how they could feasibly ban them from the Green Line since that's where all the testing occurs.

realtype wrote:
I think my first reaction when they first started appearing on the Red Line was how loud and heavy they were. Even back then it was very easy to tell if one was approaching the station. It makes them even more like the NYCT rolling stock.

They seem to have more in common with the R160 NYC railcars than they do with WMATA's 1k-6k railcars.

The only thing they have in common with WMATA rolling stock is a few cosmetic features like their shape, length, seating positions, number of windows and number of doors.

The interior and the exterior look more like the NYC R160 than any other rolling stock in the U.S. or the world I can think of. Almost like they were trying to copy NYC as much as they could without completely abandoning the WMATA signature look.