S stock delivery & introduction - discussion

I mean rustle the tree, don't shake it

Sticking to facts for a moment. The control centre at Hammersmith was built for a completely different signalling system that has a decentralised system architecture. The Thales system is centralised thus needs more space. It is true that it is smaller than would be ideal for the Thales kit but with some reconfiguration of the equipment rooms everything fits in.

This is more a topic for the SSR signalling thread than S stock perhaps ?

There are 89 S7s in London at the moment so that means 5 more are needed to make up 94 which leaves 39 to be delivered once the frequency increases.

As far as I know only 1 has gone back to Derby and is still there.

Ah ok fair enough but isn't it a bit awkward to have one met line train permanently different to all the others?

Train 192 will be a proper S7, which is the replacement for the nominated Croxley train. This is Train 72 (S7+1 - 21328-21327). So the Met will have 58xS8 and 1xS7+1. Nothing has been decided yet on the numbering (which is a bit of a can of worms!).

That's just what I was wondering.

The extra cars in the S7+1s came from other S7s - Trains 99, 100 and 101 which are S6s in Derby. Train 99 is now (or will be soon) back to proper S7 with the release of 23582.

The 'new' S7+1 already exists and the Met already has its 59th train (Train 72 - 21328-21327 plus extra car 23586). To the best of my knowledge it will not have its seating configuration altered so an all-transverse-seat train will pop up anywhere in S8 land.

Yes, the two extra cars will go into Train 100 and Train 101 to bring them back to S7s. As you say, I think the numbering is still 'up in the air'.

In addition to seating and numbering, there are a few things I'm wondering about these changes. I realise that the answers to several of these questions might not be known yet.

I understand from reading reganorak's and tridentalx's posts that that both remaining S7+1s will continue to operate until the S8 stock fleet has all been fitted with ATC, then at that point unit 21323 will return to standard 7-car formation with car 25384 becoming spare, while unit 21327 is now permanently part of the Met's fleet in its current formation. Am I correct in thinking that is the current plan?

With three S8s at Derby for modification at any one time, the Met should therefore have 57 trains available for service. By how much has the total number of trains required in service on the line increased since the S stock was first introduced, as the Met's available A stock fleet at that time was only 55 trains (or around 52 - 53 back when some were needed to operate the ELL)? Would having one less train (and therefore not needing the spare M2 car) result in cancellations due to stock shortages?

Both M2 cars in S7+1 units are 25xxx cars with de-icing equipment. Is unit 21327 likely to have that equipment removed from the 'extra' car (assuming it is currently fitted)? And will the new M2 cars for units 21383 and 21385 be de-icing cars?

fitting and testing of ATO equipment, would be a guess.

Simon

I've just boarded a train at Wimbledon. As I got to the platform, none of the doors on first car were open, but a stream of people were exiting from the rest of the train (which left a lot of people in the first car frantically pushing the buttons!). I assumed that perhaps the train didn't hit it's mark correctly and so none of the first and last doors opened, however upon walking through the train to the last car, all doors were open. Just curious as to what may have caused none of the first to be open, but all of the last?