Silverliner V: Progress Reports

Ahh, Septa got caught. hehehehe fun when that happens

Gee - no surprise how Rotem got the order, looks like political pressure wins again

As an aside, for all the Rotem bashing going on, look who barely beat them out. Rotem could make serious inroads in the US if they learn that being slightly better than Bombardier and a lot cheaper, is really all that you need...

Kawasaki's subway cars are nice, the LIRR's bilevels are nice (even if obscenely heavy), and I've heard the new meta stuff's pretty good. But I'm not at all surprised the Japanese would score high technically...

I am not looking forward to the Silverliner V production models. Those train cars will be one corrupted piece of sh*t when it comes to performance. I am going to quote this message in a few years when they start to arrive.

And would you think SEPTA wants to order vehicles from Kawasaki again? Our current ones literally "breathe" before the even start to accelerate!

KAWASAKI-FAN100 wrote:I am not looking forward to the Silverliner V production models. Those train cars will be one corrupted piece of sh*t when it comes to performance. I am going to quote this message in a few years when they start to arrive.

And would you think SEPTA wants to order vehicles from Kawasaki again? Our current ones literally "breathe" before the even start to accelerate!

I'm sure they *want* to, but it all depends on the lowest bidder.

KAWASAKI-FAN100 wrote:And would you think SEPTA wants to order vehicles from Kawasaki again? Our current ones literally "breathe" before the even start to accelerate!

Well the only two successful car procurements by SEPTA (aside from the push-pull sets which were an off-shelf product) were both Kawasaki. If by "breathing" you mean the brakes releasing on the B-IV cars, I don't see much to complain about there. The B-IVs are approaching 30 years old and have been the most reliable on the system. Meanwhile, the Kawasaki streetcars are past 25 years old and still running quite well (Kawasaki can't be blamed for all the problems stemming from the CBTC system).

Matthew Mitchell wrote:

KAWASAKI-FAN100 wrote:And would you think SEPTA wants to order vehicles from Kawasaki again? Our current ones literally "breathe" before the even start to accelerate!

Well the only two successful car procurements by SEPTA (aside from the push-pull sets which were an off-shelf product) were both Kawasaki. If by "breathing" you mean the brakes releasing on the B-IV cars, I don't see much to complain about there. The B-IVs are approaching 30 years old and have been the most reliable on the system. Meanwhile, the Kawasaki streetcars are past 25 years old and still running quite well (Kawasaki can't be blamed for all the problems stemming from the CBTC system).

I would've expected that the SL5 bid go to Kawasaki given that generally favorable past experience. I'm surprised that didn't seem to play any part. But oh well.

Nick L wrote:I would've expected that the SL5 bid go to Kawasaki given that generally favorable past experience. I'm surprised that didn't seem to play any part. But oh well.

How long have you been living in Philadelphia??

Nobody knows how the Silverliner V's will perform until they get out out there and get put through the ringer. I'd have to assume that with Hyundai's track record in other countries that they can put out something decent. Anything that's brand new with working air conditioning will be a welcome relief to the Silverliner II/III's. I rode on the LIRR last weekend, and the M7's are a night-and-day difference between anything Septa has.

cpontani wrote:Nobody knows how the Silverliner V's will perform until they get out out there and get put through the ringer. I'd have to assume that with Hyundai's track record in other countries that they can put out something decent. Anything that's brand new with working air conditioning will be a welcome relief to the Silverliner II/III's. I rode on the LIRR last weekend, and the M7's are a night-and-day difference between anything Septa has.

Air conditioning won't really matter without vestibules... Wait until the V's experience their first Philly Heat Wave.

Normally I wouldn't say it makes much difference since they've been dealing with vestibule-less cars in the NYC area for decades now, but the stations on Septa are much closer together. Again, brand new a/c should be able to keep up...

cpontani wrote:Normally I wouldn't say it makes much difference since they've been dealing with vestibule-less cars in the NYC area for decades now, but the stations on Septa are much closer together. Again, brand new a/c should be able to keep up...

NYC area? Most of the stations there, IIRC, are mostly underground. I haven't ridden LIRR or MNRR, but the only vestibule-less cars I am aware of are the NJT multi-level cars.

Aren't the ubiquitous Bombardier bi-level cars used in so many hot places like Southern California and Texas and Florida vestibule-less (in addition to the aforementioned LIRR and MNRR MU cars)?

R3 Passenger wrote: NYC area? Most of the stations there, IIRC, are mostly underground. I haven't ridden LIRR or MNRR, but the only vestibule-less cars I am aware of are the NJT multi-level cars.

Underground does not necessarily make one immune to temperature extremes. Usually the underground temperatures just lag behind the surface temperatures, for example if the nightly low temperature on the street is at 1am, the low temperature in the subway is around 3am, if the high temperature on the street is at 2pm, the high temperature in the subway would be around 5pm.
There are other factors, which I believe cancel each other out, subways usually don't have cross winds that we get on surface stations, but they do have more through winds generated by trains in the tunnel pushing and pulling air into the stations.

Most , maybe even all, LIRR and MNRR electric MU's have 2 sets of double width subway style doors per side, about the same width as the Silverliner 5, PATCO, Market Frankford El and Riverline, all of which seem to tolerably handle maintaining interior temperature with lots of variations of surface vs below ground, closely spaced, stations.

Most of NJTransit's commuter cars, electric MU's and powerless coaches, have center doors without vestibules but with bulkheads, like the Silverliner 4 center plug where a door was proposed, in addition to traditional end vestibule doors, again with no extreme complaints I know of about inability to maintain inside temperature. And some of NTTransit's lines have stations just about as closely spaced as SEPTA's.

octr202 wrote: Aren't the ubiquitous Bombardier bi-level cars used in so many hot places like Southern California and Texas and Florida vestibule-less (in addition to the aforementioned LIRR and MNRR MU cars)?

I don't remember if they are vestibule-less, there may be an interior door before one gets to the passenger area. But in addition to those hot places, the first place that had what I call hot-dog, or lozenge, cars in North America was frigid Toronto. One method they employed was at appropriate times to engage a button that allowed passengers to open doors, something I've seen in several light rail articulated MU trains, the intent was that only doors that passengers wanted to use would open, instead of the crew opening all doors.

Yes, Gardenence hit the nail on the head...LIRR/Metro North MU's have quarterpoint doors, and the NJT Arrow III's have center doors. They've been running them since the 70s.

There are plenty of above-ground subway stations in NYC, and each car has three or four sets of doors on each side. They seem to be cooler than outside even above ground in the summer.

Cpontani raised a good point. Most residents of Long Island love to hate the LIRR. But, I tell everybody here who will listen that LIRR and Metro-North are a class act compared to the commuter rail systems in other Northeast cities like Boston and Phili. LIRR for instance, has had all high platforms and cars with subway style quarterpoint doors, air-conditioning and automatic speed-control in all electrified territory since 1970 (!) And now has TVM's at every station. Also, LIRR does have a couple of branches (Far Rockaway and Hempstead) with closely spaced stations and it doesn't adversely affect the air-conditioning when it's working right. Sorry, this was a little off-topic.