Acela II (Alstom Avelia Liberty): Design, Production, Delivery, Acceptance

[Gilbert B Norman]

^^ Seeing that video reiterates how gorgeous these trains actually are.

Wholly agree, Mr. Wheel.

Addition of the "fusion" livery between the Power Unit and the trailing car minimized the break between the straight sided Unit and the contoured car.

Could have the unit been redesigned so as to have contoured side? In all likelihood, yes.

Would that redesign have a price? Of course. Just think if the redesign worked out to be $100K a unit, that would have added $5.6M to the contract.

I know some disagree, especially within the advocacy community ("they won't give us back full service Dining"}; but they "ain't dumb" at One Mass. I've known enough of 'em along the way to affirm that first hand.

[Matt Johnson]

On the other hand, virtually no other high speed train out there has such a discongruous look and you'd think for all the money spent on this flagship product, they'd want to get the details right. But it is what it is I guess. That mismatch still sticks out like a sore thumb to me though.

[photobug56]

Agreed. Design looks like done by committee and subcommittee with no one assigned to unite the pieces from the different subcommittees. So one team designs the motor card, one the passenger cars. And never the twain shall meet. And the horns are probably selected out of a catalog sorted by price, lowest first. IOTW, a government design, with no effort towards optimization. So each part may look good, or not, but not matchup between parts, and a horn that's neither safe or effective or decent sounding. Reminding you of the worst of government at work.

[Fan Railer]

I haven't read back in this thread to know if this has been mentioned yet, but the lack of congruity between the power cars and the coaches has to do with the way the tilting mechanism alters the positioning of the coaches in relation to the power cars. The coaches are shaped in a way so that when they do tilt, they do not exceed the clearance envelope of the power cars, which do not tilt.

[photobug56]

Understood, but it would have looked a lot better especially when standing still.

[Rockingham Racer]

These things are pretty compared to some other equipment I've seen in Asia, which look like ducks, IMO.

[bostontrainguy]

I haven't read back in this thread to know if this has been mentioned yet, but the lack of congruity between the power cars and the coaches has to do with the way the tilting mechanism alters the positioning of the coaches in relation to the power cars. The coaches are shaped in a way so that when they do tilt, they do not exceed the clearance envelope of the power cars, which do not tilt.

Are you sure about that? I thought the same until I saw this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w9ZoWqI ... nel=Amtrak

If you watch the videos out of Pueblo, it certainly looks like the power cars do tilt but I don't know for sure.

[Fan Railer]

I haven't read back in this thread to know if this has been mentioned yet, but the lack of congruity between the power cars and the coaches has to do with the way the tilting mechanism alters the positioning of the coaches in relation to the power cars. The coaches are shaped in a way so that when they do tilt, they do not exceed the clearance envelope of the power cars, which do not tilt.

Are you sure about that? I thought the same until I saw this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w9ZoWqI ... nel=Amtrak

If you watch the videos out of Pueblo, it certainly looks like the power cars do tilt but I don't know for sure.

The curves at Pueblo are extremely super-elevated, and I can tell just by seeing the contour difference between the coaches and the power cars that tilting is not activated in that video.

Tilting power cars would put undue stress on the pantograph and overhead wires, potentially causing damage. Additional tilting is for passenger comfort, so tilting power cars doesn't make sense from either a comfort perspective or a weight management perspective.

Below is a crude image in MS paint that I just drew up to help visualize why the train set is designed this way. After coming to understand this myself, it dawned on me that when the train is actually tilting, you will be able to tell fairly easily.

[Pensyfan19]

That still isn´t aerodynamic in some sense. Just have the power cars tilt like they did in the original trailer from a few years ago. This way there would be no need for the coaches to be in a different shape than the power car. Problem solved.

[8th Notch]

I’ll have to do some asking but I believe the power cars do tilt as that is how they were advertised. Whether or not it has made it into the final design or has even been enabled during testing is the question.

[Matt Johnson]

Tilting power cars could in theory be done, but as it would add weight and tilting is strictly for passenger comfort there would be little reason for it. The self propelled Pendolino EMUs have carbodies that tilt around a fixed pantograph support structure.

As these are next gen TGV locomotives I'm sure they did not modify them to add tilt. The original CGI concept did indicate tilt, but then it also indicated matching carbody profiles so reality of course differs from the initial concept.

[west point]

With no tilt power cars how are they coupled to the passenger car that tilts ?

[eolesen]

The bolsters, drawbars, and trucks don't tilt.

[Matt Johnson]

The bolsters, drawbars, and trucks don't tilt.

And note that it's nothing new - same setup as with the current Acela, or the Swedish X2000 (which has a tilting cab control car on one end and a non-tilting locomotive on the other).

[Gilbert B Norman]

Anyone see this on CBS Morning News?

https://www.cbsnews.com/video/an-inside ... t-train/#x