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VIA Rail

Bordercollie said:
Lol.

If it was that easy why were they going to cancel the train to Halifax for not being able to use the port?
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They weren't. The service was temporarily suspended since March 2020 because of an ongoing global pandemic, but it was already announced a few months before that that the trainset would be converted by November 2020 to perform exactly the procedure I outlined in my previous post.
 
Urban Sky said:
They weren't. The service was temporarily suspended since March 2020 because of an ongoing global pandemic, but it was already announced a few months before that that the trainset would be converted by November 2020 to perform exactly the procedure I outlined in my previous post.
Click to expand...

Urban Sky said:
They weren't. The service was temporarily suspended since March 2020 because of an ongoing global pandemic, but it was already announced a few months before that that the trainset would be converted by November 2020 to perform exactly the procedure I outlined in my previous post.
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My apologies for missing your post, but what modifications to the trainset were required?
 
Bordercollie said:
My apologies for missing your post, but what modifications to the trainset were required?
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Not sure what you are apologizing about, but maybe it's easiest to explain like this:

Have you ever played with a wooden toy railway (like from Brio)? If yes, what happens if you take a car and turn it around - will it still connect with the rest of the train?

Just like with the magnets used as cupplers for that toy train, the Renaissance cars are configured in a way which prevents you from taking a car within a train consist and reversing its orientation at will. But whereas magnets have thankfully only two different polarities, the couplers used by the Renaissance cars come in four different variants (M, F, Q and A) and any of them only matches with only one of the four types (M<=>F, Q<=>Q and A is just a standard American coupler). Add to that the questions of seat orientation (which basically can't be changed) and electrical wiring and you only start to appreciate what an operational nightmare these trains are...
 
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Urban Sky said:
Not sure what you are apologizing about, but maybe it's easiest to explain like this:

Have you ever played with a wooden toy railway (like from Brio)? If yes, what happens if you take a car and turn it around - will it still connect with the rest of the train?

Just like with the magnets used as cupplers for that toy train, the Renaissance cars are configured in a way which prevents you from taking a car and reversing its orientation at will. But whereas magnets have thankfully only two different polarities, the couplers used by the Renaissance cars come in four different variants (M, F, Q and A) and any of them only matches with only one of the four types (M<=>F, Q<=>Q and A is just a standard American coupler). Add to that the questions of seat orientation (which basically can't be changed) and electrical wiring and you only start to appreciate what an operational nightmare these trains are...
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So...they are going to pull the train backwards and move the park car to the transition car? So how will they turn the park car? Is there a wye for that?
 
To the rear of the train there is a yard that the locomotives can do a run around to connect to the rear.

The rear Park car will be behind the loco's going to Montreal unless they get permission from a container yard that has a loop track if no loading/off loading taking place at the time to turn it around.

I stand to be corrected, but when I was here last the last tine there was a y, but gone now,

CN yard is plug full with 2 GE C44-9W shut down in it, No container ship in Halifax today. The yard was very empty the last time I was here.
 
Urban Sky said:
Step 1: Push train somewhere with a track available to run around the train.
Step 2: Detach locomotives.
Step 3: Have locomotives run around the train.
Step 4: Attach locomotives at the opposite end of the train.
Step 5: Push train back to the station track.
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You will notice in the oritinal post that the locomotives are now back to back (cabs facing out) to facilitate this operation, so that when they run around the train, there is still a cab facing forward:

drum118 said:
View attachment 335027
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drum118 said:
To the rear of the train there is a yard that the locomotives can do a run around to connect to the rear.

The rear Park car will be behind the loco's going to Montreal unless they get permission from a container yard that has a loop track if no loading/off loading taking place at the time to turn it around.

I stand to be corrected, but when I was here last the last tine there was a y, but gone now,

CN yard is plug full with 2 GE C44-9W shut down in it, No container ship in Halifax today. The yard was very empty the last time I was here.
Click to expand...

Although, looking at the photos you originally posted, it doesn't look like there is a park car at either end of the train:

drum118 said:
View attachment 335029
View attachment 335026
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Bordercollie said:
My apologies for missing your post, but what modifications to the trainset were required?
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None were necessary.

The Renaissance equipment - in its previous guise as the aborted Nightstar trans-Chunnel overnight train - was designed from the outset to be bidirectional (sleeper corridors notwithstanding). And it didn't lose that capability with its modification and introduction to service in Canada.

The Budd equipment is in the same boat - with the exception of the tail-end Park car, all of the cars are more-or-less ambivalent to their direction of travel.

Dan
 
smallspy said:
None were necessary.

The Renaissance equipment - in its previous guise as the aborted Nightstar trans-Chunnel overnight train - was designed from the outset to be bidirectional (sleeper corridors notwithstanding). And it didn't lose that capability with its modification and introduction to service in Canada.
Click to expand...

I respectfully disagree. The Nightstar trains were designed to be unidirectional, as being overnight trains, they had plenty of time to turn them around during the day while being stored in a yard. From a passenger perspective, most of the cars are agnostic to the direction, but as @Urban Sky said, the couplers and wiring are directional. The big exception are the coaches, as the seats all face in the same direction, so unless you want to have everyone face backwards in one direction, that is a problem.

smallspy said:
The Budd equipment is in the same boat - with the exception of the tail-end Park car, all of the cars are more-or-less ambivalent to their direction of travel.
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That is true, but they didn't use much HEP (Budd) equipment on the Ocean prior to COVID. This picture I took in 2018 shows only 2 HEP cars (one of which was a Park car).

1626365425515.png


Whereas this recent photo posted by @drum118 seems to show 4 HEP cars, and no park cars:
drum118 said:
View attachment 335029
Click to expand...
 
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roger1818 said:
I respectfully disagree. The Nightstar trains were designed to be unidirectional, as being overnight trains, they had plenty of time to turn them around during the day while being stored in a yard. From a passenger perspective, most of the cars are agnostic to the direction, but as @Urban Sky said, the couplers and wiring are directional. The big exception are the coaches, as the seats all face in the same direction, so unless you want to have everyone face backwards in one direction, that is a problem.



That is true, but they didn't use much HEP (Budd) equipment on the Ocean prior to COVID. This picture I took in 2018 shows only 2 HEP cars (one of which was a Park car).

View attachment 335195

Whereas this recent photo posted by @drum118 seems to show 4 HEP cars, and no park cars:
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Just to be sure: I no longer work for VIA and I have no idea whether (and if yes: how) they modified the Renaissance cars (I recall that at least 3 HEP coaches underwent a project in preparation for deployment on the Ocean, but I don't know if that was anything beyond refurbishing the interiors). All I was saying is that the Renaissance fleet holds ridiculously complex operational constraints and that changing the Ocean's Renaissance configuration to anything else than the customary BAG-ECO(s)-Accessible ECO-Service-Diner-Service-Accessible SLE-SLE(s)-Baggage Transition configuration can be very costly or lead to very weird compromises which only make sense when you ask the right people at MMC...

For the same reason, I would also assume that it would be very difficult and costly to revive a Corridor night train with Renaissance equipment...
 
Urban Sky said:
Just to be sure: I no longer work for VIA and I have no idea whether (and if yes: how) they modified the Renaissance cars (I recall that at least 3 HEP coaches underwent a project in preparation for deployment on the Ocean, but I don't know if that was anything beyond refurbishing the interiors). All I was saying is that the Renaissance fleet holds ridiculously complex operational constraints and that changing the Ocean's Renaissance configuration to anything else than the customary BAG-ECO(s)-Accessible ECO-Service-Diner-Service-Accessible SLE-SLE(s)-Baggage Transition configuration can be very costly or lead to very weird compromises which only make sense when you ask the right people at MMC...

For the same reason, I would also assume that it would be very difficult and costly to revive a Corridor night train with Renaissance equipment...
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So to turn the train, they would need to uncouple the trainset and then turn each car one by one?

Or without the parkcar they could pull the entire trainset backwards? But I thought the seats only face one way?
 
Bordercollie said:
So to turn the train, they would need to uncouple the trainset and then turn each car one by one?
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It's much more complicated than that: some cars have quick couplers on one side (which only couple with other quick couplers) and you can't turn the baggage or baggage transition car because they have standard American couplers on the other side...

Or without the parkcar they could pull the entire trainset backwards? But I thought the seats only face one way?
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There is a reason why non-corridor trains typically have their baggage car next to the locomotive(s) and the coaches directly afterwards. This is not possible with a Park car, unless it's at the opposite end of the train...
 
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