SSL substation upgrades

[Deleted]

Whilst doing some reading in uk.railway about the Southern Region power supply upgrade for the new trains, I began to wonder about the looming introduction of S stock on the SSL.

Has any information come to light with regards to what sort of demands the S stock will place on the SSL substations, and whether or not the substations have sufficient capacity to supply enough power?

[Colin]

I asked a similar question about that, though relating to the refurbished D stock, ages ago - actually, it may have been on the old (pre-proboards) forum. I didn't get an answer then - but it would be nice if someone could answer that now.............

[Deleted]

It has been implied that the S stock will have air conditioning throughout, in which case I would have thought a power upgrade would be needed.

[Deleted]

This of course begs the question of what sort of (expensive) immunisation the substations would need to prevent them from doing Strange Things when the fancy new traction packages of the S stock are tested.

Come to think about it, where _would_ such a thing be done? Would Metronet ask TfL to suspend services on one of the outlying SSL branch lines (i.e. Uxbridge), position AETs and measuring devices in the appropriate locations and start running the trains to see what sort of wobblies the power systems would throw (not to mention the signalling too!)?

[Deleted]

if they were going to run tests it would normally take place on the test track between northfields and south ealing / acton town

[Deleted]

aetearlscourt said:

if they were going to run tests it would normally take place on the test track between northfields and south ealing / acton town

Yeah, but when you're testing new traction packages that may play merry stinkers with the signalling, is the test track best suited in such a situation?

[Deleted]

well i think so yes as it does not affect a main running line but no doubt some bright spark will have other ideas