Viewliner II Delivery/Production

jp1822 wrote:Amtrak has 11 Viewliner 1 sleepers in reserve. They can still roll out the new sleepers and do massive overhauls and refurbishing on say one of the "11" in reserve. I realize it's not the same 11 Viewliners that are always out held in reserve, but with that many cars not being used there's no reason why Amtrak couldn't do three or four Viewliner 1 refurbs as the new cars come out. This way you'd still be adding capacity.......the only way this plan wouldn't work is if you had about 4 Viewliner 1's go into wreck/repair status. Just get the CAF order dome!!!!!

Message quoted in its entirety as it appears on a previous page and is wholly relevant to this response.

Mr. JP, if Amtrak is to move ahead with the stated plan to standardize the configuration as well as electrical and plumbing components of the V-I fleet with that of the V-II, they likely will want to set up a production line at Beech Grove and hire additional workers so that the project will expediently move forth. It cannot move forth in such manner if BEE gets "one car here one car there". Marketing will want the project "done yesterday" as will other fiefdoms @ 60 Mass. While possibly the number of V-I's that would otherwise be shopped for "heavies" could be withdrawn from the noted pool of eleven protect cars, I would not wish to venture any more.

They've got to be thinking "change of plans" in Washington. They need to get as many cars in service as they possibly can. The regular Beech Grove production cycles can be quite good for the purpose of doing a heavy overhaul cycle including changing out modules etc. I expect this effort will be conducted "in house" in which case they'll need to take a car out of service to prototype the effort anyways. That work alone could take up to a year between initial production setup and vendor contracts. In the meantime, perhaps for the first time ever[/i] in its history Amtrak will be flush with capacity in their single level sleeping car fleet.

jp1822 wrote:Amtrak has 11 Viewliner 1 sleepers in reserve. They can still roll out the new sleepers and do massive overhauls and refurbishing on say one of the "11" in reserve.

Wild guess, but If the 11 are operating reserve held 4 at NYP, 3 at WAS, and 4 in MIA (made-up-numbers) as insurance against wrecks or other serious outages, then they're all spoken for and can't be cycled out for overhaul.

I would actually guess that at least one or two are cycling through Beech Grove at any given time. In fact if you look at the Monthly Performance Report for September 2016 (See PDF Page 31/71) you will see that Amtrak conducted overhauls on 11 Viewliners in FY16 (two less than projected goal for whatever reason). The plan for 13 strongly hints at "one a month" +/-. Assume that at any given time that would mean two cars either at Beech Grove or in transit to/from Beech Grove or awaiting transfer/pickup.

11 spare V-1 sleepers right now ? Highly doubt it as this whole Christmas season several times Meteor has had at least 4 .

Usually at any given time there are three Viewliners down for scheduled maintenance, three for unscheduled maintenance, spare cars in Chicago, NYC (2), Miami, and NOLA for a total of 11 cars. I believe that is what Trains said a few years back, don't know if it has changed or not.
Cheers,
Nick

east point wrote:11 spare V-1 sleepers right now ? Highly doubt it as this whole Christmas season several times Meteor has had at least 4 .

Mr. East Point, the operative term for such appears to be "surge"; I have seen videos of the Meteor with four Sleeper lines as well. Obviously, same occurs with all equipment during the peak travel periods such as Thanx. No doubt, periodics have been accelerated incurring overtime pay at the maintenance facilities. There are a few managers who are "holding their breath", for if something goes bad order, there are simply no spare locomotives or cars available.

One must wonder how often the "late set" explanation arises from a car(s) having to be yanked from an inbound consist of, say, #4 at Lumber Street (CHI) and turned same day for outbound #3. Or how about when I have seen #3 by here with only one P-42 (I'd guess a unit was cut from #4 somewhere to the East of Raton to be added to that #3 consist, or else Warren gave Amtrak "a little help over the hill").

Those cars on hold are needed in an instant as soon as there is a snow storm as these old Viewliners freeze up very quickly on the lake shore with the snow and ice. There is no room to have anything out right now for a long term overhaul, which is what the Viewliner to LDSL upgrade would entail. The overhauls being done currently at beech grove are regular scheduled overhauls which are nowhere near as extensive as whats going to have to happen with the CAF compatible LDSL upgrades. Current overhauls may have a car held up for a month or so at most while all serviceable wear items are replaced, fabrics refreshed, leaks checked, HVAC unit replace/overhaul etc. To do the upgrades could take 6 months or more probably as the car would need to basically be gutted down to the bare metal, all plumbing and electrical rerouted and new modules installed.

I would hope, Mr. Approach, that the V-II's have had their plumbing systems perfected to avoid the freeze up problem. If such be the case, which will likely not be known until the V-II's enter revenue service and are exposed to operating conditions confronted by the Lake Shore and Cardinal, then I believe it would strongly be in Amtrak's interest to move forth with the standardization.

Now I'm not really advocating this considering that BEE does quality work refurbishing cars, but the nature and scope of such a project might rise to the level of contracting out. As far as I know, V-I prototype 2300 is laying around somewhere to be a guinea pig, so once the "bugs" are worked out (I have to wonder if the V-I's have developed a structural "sag", which could complicate fitting the modules, but I should defer that point to others around here) to set up an assembly line. I'm sure the Shop Crafts' Chairmen would be quick to say their guys and gals are up to it. But BEE and Bear (don't know it's facility code) work on a "job order" base, and an outside contractor's assembly line could prove the most efficient manner to handle such a project. Further, Amtrak would have to go out and hire, say, 100 people for the surge, only to have to lay off most of them when the project is done. Talk about how to create instability within your workforce, that's got to be it.

Gilbert B Norman wrote:I would hope, Mr. Approach, that the V-II's have had their plumbing systems perfected to avoid the freeze up problem.

The biggest change of all was not having toilets in each unit. The greatly reduced plumbing scheme has been advanced as the biggest reason of all why the new cars will be far more reliable in cold weather conditions than their predecessors. I would not be in the least bit surprised to see an attempt made to assign the new equipment to the Cardinal and Lake Shore Limited as often as possible in the winter in order to avoid problems associated with freezing.

The only time I have ridden in a sleeper was when I got a tremendous deal on a Roomette BOS-SYR (I assumed that someone else had booked a sleeper BUF-CHI). My experience with the toilet in the compartment left me with absolutely no regrets regarding its absence in the V-IIs: small, awkward, and when you're done you've just done your business next to where you're sitting.

The new cars have a covering system over the entire car underbody, that can be seen on the bags. That covering isnt weatherproof, but its resistant and keeps the cold air from flowing over all of the pipes and freezing them.

Having just dined in car 8512 (ex-NYC, 1948 model), from a customer perspective, the car seems to be in very good shape, and not visibly much older than my 1990s-era Viewliner I sleeper. Amtrak has kept the diner up well on the inside. Hopefully someone else can get good use out of the Heritage diners for a while.

east point wrote:11 spare V-1 sleepers right now ? Highly doubt it as this whole Christmas season several times Meteor has had at least 4 .

Let's do a reality check here. If anyone thinks there are extra Viewliner sleepers just "sitting around" in Chicago, New Orleans, or Washington DC, I have a bridge to sell you. Sunnyside NY barely has two or three Viewliners as spares. The spares are mostly sitting down in Hialeah, FL, the home base for the Viewliners, OR receiving work out in Beech Grove. I've never heard of more than three Viewliners being worked on at a time.

Since Gunn was in office - and we are going back to what 2003? - Amtrak has only operated 39 Viewliner Sleepers in revenue service as follows:

2 Sleepers - Cardinal (1 per train set, 2 train sets required)
9 Sleepers - Lake Shore Limited (3 per train set, 3 train sets required)
8 Sleepers - Crescent (2 per train set, 4 train sets required)
8 Sleepers - Silver Star (2 per train set, 4 train sets required)
12 Sleepers - Silver Meteor* (3 per train set, 4 train sets required)

39 Sleepers - TOTAL

* Now, ONLY since around November 15th, 2016 and through roughly the Christmas Season, the Silver Meteor supposedly has been running with four sleepers (up from three sleepers per train set). I've only seen pictures from Thanksgiving so I hope people are not seeing the Viewliner Diner - "Annapolis" or "Indianapolis" at present - and presuming there's another Viewliner sleeper in the consist. The Viewliners are available!

1. Gone is the overnight sleeping car service on the NEC that had one Viewliner sleeper.
2. Gone is the Three Rivers that had one Viewliner sleeper.
3. Gone is the SAME DAY turn of equipment of the Silver Meteor that would allow three (currently four) Viewliners to be re-assigned (the Three Rivers, NEC overnight service etc.). The inbound Meteor used to arrive in NYP by 10 am and then head back out at 7 pm. For the most part, this worked and allowed Amtrak to have more Viewliners on the road. Sometimes they had to do a "rob Peter to pay Paul." The Crescent was typically on time and its sleepers were used on the Silver Meteor if the Meteor was really late in getting in.
4. Amtrak has completely dumbed down Sunnyside Yard operations Sleeping cars are sitting at Sunnyside for 24 hours or more before being sent back out!

So with the Meteor operating with four Viewliners, this means 43 out of the 50 Viewliner sleepers are in revenue service. And that makes sense to put them on the Silver Meteor as we are in the "migratory" season for patrons going to Florida. However, Amtrak hasn't figured out that it may be necessary to put a third sleeper line on the Capitol Limited. They only figured it out for one or two days over the Thanksgiving holiday. Midwesterners travelling East will connect with the Meteor to head to Florida. That's a very heavy connection. Nonetheless, the Meteor still shows sold out on various days even with 4 Viewliner sleepers. How long the four Viewliner sleepers will stay is a question. First year it's been done!

Let's say 3 Viewliners are in NYP Sunnyside Yard in reserve - and that's likely generous.
Then let's say 4 Viewliner are in Hialeah for maintenance work.

That then leaves 50 Viewliners accounted for.

Again, the four sleepers operating on the Silver Meteor JUST STARTED on November 15th, 2016. So we'll see when Amtrak pulls that back. I doubt it is going to be a year-round assignment. I am actually surprised it lasted beyond Thanksgiving as usually it was pulled.

So Amtrak is holding 7 extra Viewliners right now between Hialeah and Sunnyside in NY AS LONG THE SILVER METOER HAS FOUR SLEEPERS. And ironically it could use more, as mentioned. Many Viewliners were in sold out status this past week.

Once Amtrak is settled on what the Viewliner II sleeper (released from testing and out operating etc.) - Amtrak should start pumping the Viewliner 1's through overhauls. Why? It can't afford to have a bunch of Viewliners out of service. There can be no more than a 1 for 1 trade. Putting three Viewliners through an overhaul so they come out looking like Viewliner II's can be done sooner than later is my point. Then does the overhaul get done at the Viewliner base of Hialeah, or Beech Grove? I guess Beech Grove. They can setup an assembly line, but again I can't imagine more than 3 or 4 sleepers being worked on at a given time. Take from the Viewliners that are "spares." When VIA Rail Canada sent its cars out to make them into Prestige class cars, only 3 or 4 were worked on in assembly at a given time.

But the fact of the matter is, Amtrak is operating more Viewliners in revenue service right now then they have in over 13 YEARS - that is 43 out of 50 Viewliners, IF INDEED the Silver Meteor is still operating with a fourth Viewliner. Once that fourth Viewliner comes off, it's back to the 39 in assignment and 11 in reserve!

Something else to think about....How long are Viewliner SLEEPERS sleeping in Sunnyside Yard now (per schedule)?

Lake Shore Limited - nearly 24 hours.
Silver Meteor - 28 HOURS!!!!
Crescent - 25 hours.
Cardinal - overnight only
Silver Star - overnight only

To me it's not efficient to have sleeping cars spending more than 12 hours in a yard. Re-shuffle, get better utilization. Sleeping cars are NOT meant to spend over 12 hours in a yard.

A lot of sleeping car service has been lost by Amtrak over the years yet it needs all the sleepers possible as they run SOLD OUT on a lot of trips! It's been said when the Viewliner II's come, overnight service on the NEC will be restored. Frankly, instead of adding single level through cars to the Capitol Limited at Pittsburgh from NYP, Amtrak should give serious thought to reviving the Broadway Limited. This will "unlock" and freeup the Capitol Limited and Lake Shore to be re-scheduled etc.

But for the most part the Viewliner II's are only supposed to be augmenting existing sleeper lines but some restoration of sleeper lines lost in the early 21st Century are to occur.

EDIT - Calculation error fixed.