@@britishairways744 it meant for short trips on low ridership routes, to meet minimum service requirements, but was used to replace proper trains on longer routes.
"why have you brought me to a bus grave yard then?" Bit offensive considering they were on the premises of the North West Vehicle Restoration Trust group, and using one of their immaculately completed classic bus projects for filming :'D
BusThrash Ha, I knew I recognised that place in Kirkby! As for the Pacers... I find them alright myself But I am a rail enthusiast lol. They are ok when they are on their own lines. I will miss them when they are gone, although only a handful make it to Liverpool these days since the 319s took over, but that's another chapter!
@@BusThrash For TV you need to put an emphasis on old and unwanted. Wouldn't be a good script if he said "look at these gorgeous buses" then start whinging about the same vehicle in another form.
It Sounds like people in the south have the same issues with public transport as us northerners do. Public transport in my opinion is just Shocking, Buses that don't turn up or are late and trains that are delayed, or cancelled regularly. No one is ever going to give up their private transport and lose the convenience of private transport for that.
As a commuter I don't care what the train is as long as it shows up on time and gets me home. If a Pacer turns up, yeah its noisy and bounces a bit but can be fairly sure it will get me where I want go. I can't say that of many newer types which seem to collapse in in heap as soon as computers say no. We should be applauding the fact that these trains have soldiered on for twice their intended design life and are still very reliable workhorses.
The truth is you just can't satisfy everyone. An old analogue workhorse is better than all that computerised garbage you get on the rails nowadays, and are they all reliable?? I used to travel on a lot of the MK1 Nationals with Strathclyde buses back in the day, but never had the pleasure of riding the Class 143 and 144 Pacer trains and I believe they're all gone now. Shame. In the end what good is having a modern train if it don't bloody turn up? If it turns up and gets me home then who cares.
Northern should start announcing "We apologize for the fact that your train is a Pacer" everytime one of those show up on a route normally used by the nicer Super Sprinters (155/156/158)
I rode a Pacer in, of all places, Canada. One pair came over in 1986 as a technology demonstrator. I rode it between New Westminster and Abbotsford, British Columbia on a diesel freight-only "short line" which had, decades earlier, been an electric passenger "interurban" line. Despite my very limited train-riding experience at the time, I distinctly remember how rough the ride was.
Look, love them.or hate them, I would suggest that few could argue that they were built as a cheap, easily available stop gap, that has FAR outlasted it's intended life and probably more than any other class, has done more to save more branch lines that would have otherwise have closed if they hadn't come along just then. On welded track they are smooth and only bounce when on jointed track. Drivers love them because of their excellent driving position and they show more the massive underinvestment in the railways back then that is only really being addressed now. I would also argue that they alone probably did more to crystalise the reality of how much underinvestment had been allowed to happen. I think we owe a HUGE debt of gratitude to the Pacer that will only truly be acknowledged once they are gone. I for one will miss them.
They have lasted as long as the Class 43 and that was more advanced. It should serve as a testament to Leyland that their National bus was just as good on the rails as it was on the road.
I used to commute on pacers everyday and there was nothing better than hearing the brakes screech into the station at the end of a long day haha. Might’ve been a bit Spartan and a tad bumpy, but these things never missed a beat and, to my own experience, ran like clockwork. There’s a void now because we only have whatever sprinter sets were spared to our line so I really miss these things, they were old but gold :)
What I find startling is that some pacers cover long distances and the Intercity 125 is 40 years old and when you travel on one you wouldn't think it was 40. Yeah fair enough I know the good old 125s are a high speed express train but it does show what decent investment provides. The reviled pacers are literally noisy bouncy castles on wheels, yeah local services up north and in Wales should be just as good as on the Southern network. A bit of equality and investment would be very nice indeed.
But they do in the Southwest... Anyway Southern's 313's are older, and only slightly better than, a Pacer. I only had to suffer one once and pity those who have to regularly. The new 700's aren't exactly comfortable either. And they don't have guards (Or the one I was on didn't!).
says someone who has never traveled on a pacer - it is the freight wagon bit that makes it so shit - it suspension was designed to keep freight from being destroyed.
The old Pacers did the Job in the south Wales valleys for 30 years they gave awesome service on very tough hilly routes they kept the valley lines running for so long just a good old workhorse they are missed in the valleys
As an update their all withdrawn now. I agree they were a 'stopgap', however there also the argument they saved alot of the railway due to their cheap running cost (british railways was really struggling at the time). So dont mock. I would also argue they were far more efficient and less likely to break down than newer one, hence why they lasted so long!. For anyone missing them lots of preserved lines bought them because they at least saw the benefits so their still plenty around. Their not entirely gone forever :-)
firstly, I'm a Yank and have never been to the UK - Only The Netherlands in that neck of the woods... I operated one of these in Train Simulator 2017...it was pretty odd. The first thing I noticed was, wow, this engine sounds odd even for a diesel. It sounded like a car's engine or a truck perhaps. It also accelerated oddly slow, and had a funnily high acceleration between say 50 and 70 miles per hour, which may have been exceeding its maximum operating speed, anyway. Wow.
Yep, that's because the engine was also from a British Leyland bus. The Pacers were originally kitted out with Leyland TL11 6 cylinder engines. They weren't particularly impressive in the buses, so they didn't exactly take the railways by storm either. I think some later variants with fitted with Cummins engines instead. They were ridiculously loud. There's virtually zero sound or vibration insulation.
"At that very moment, one of these Frankenstein trains creeps up behind them." The fact that they said Frankenstein train!!! HAHA perfect description!!!
As a recent migrant to the North fron dan sarf, I've only recently experienced pacers. I'm no train buff or a regular commuter, just an occasional day tripper but I'll offer my opinion. First impressions were that this was obviously a vehicle that had been in service for a few years as they're somewhat dated in appearance, inside and out. I didn't feel the ride quality was noticeably bumpy and I travelled on virtually empty trains as well as rush hour services. The pa system was virtually useless even though I was sat beside the speaker so I resorted to looking out of the window to keep track of my progress. The only other thing I noticed was when pulling away, the driver had to give it some gas and I got the impression that the gearbox was clutch operated but I doubt that's the case, probably automatics. If they're reasonably reliable and cost effective to operate, I couldn't really pick holes in them.
Yeah, their ride quality was OK on straight, good quality track like on the Liverpool-Manchester line, but they were really bad on curvy branch lines. So much that they swapped the pacers out for Class 15x's on some of these lines.
hydraulic transmission on the pacers, the reason why it sounded like the drivers had to input a lot of throttle to get going is that the transmission takes a few seconds to fill with oil and engage, so for those few seconds the engine is under a small load and so it surges quickly to a high RPM (or even the rev limiter) before slowing and settling down as the transmission fills and it takes up the load. this gives the impression that the driver is wacking it into full power to get going whereas really theyll only use ~50 percent power to move off
LightingDesk in terms of there being no dull moment when riding them I can see what you mean and for better or worse, they are a part of the railways history
Pacers, you either love 'em or hate 'em with a passion. Personally I like 'em, not exactly a looker, by neither was the Apollo LEM, both got the job done at the end of the day.
The Pacer would be about as comfortable too, if the people on board were in a zero G envrionment.... I used to commute on one of these in Devon. It was awful :(
Why didn't they fit Bogie's to the high speed freight wagon before putting the bus body onto it? It'd have mean't the pacer would have been more like a train that started life as a train so to speak, they would have been as comfortable as one too. Although I didn't find them uncomfortable personally, I liked the noise of their 6 cylinder 10 litre Cummins turbo diesel. engine
@@bikerguychris33 It is very simple, if you were to read @shipwright1918 's comment. They got the job done- now the question is 'what was the job'? The job was to get the operating cost per hour down to around 1/3 of the DMUs they replaced. Start sticking heavy bogies on then it's more £ to build, more £ to operate, more £ to service. Look at the 150s- more suitable in many circumstances but nearly twice the cost per unit per hour.
i've gotten quite sentimental about pacers, i agree they are horrid things but back in the day in winter when it was freezing me and me mam went to the metro centre and i always fell asleep on the way back listening to the struggling engines and breathing in the exhaust fumes which was the only thing which helped keep the coaches warm then on to a sprinter or a 37 back along the coast yam
Don't know? But you could be dreaming at night going on a pacer on the opposite way. The intercity trains and modern intercity trains are way better. Get over it.
I think that around 2030ish there will be wave of nostalgia for pacer trains and railway preservation societies will rescue a couple from the scrapheaps and restore them and run tours on them like they do with the old steam era trains and carriages.
1973Washu they'd probably need to be able to run on alternative fuel by then as fossil fuels are starting to run low so might be little left by 2030. I love steam engines and the way they smell. The pacer has served us well considering they've ran solid for 30 or more years now, but i think its time to move on now, and like you say, the heritage railways could use class 142's once they where restored as they're part of our British heritage.
HEY.............. Leave the pacer alone. Im a pacer driver and i can tell all of you begrudgers that the pacer is one of the best trains ever to grace the railways of this country. Honest, reliable, and good old fashioned british engernering and still going 30 years on. None of ye pureists or train spotters have a clue what ye are talking about. DOPES
i agree, my cousin was also a pacer driver in his early days of driving, he now drives 350s for london midland but still looks back on them with fondness, as i do
pacers suck, "reliable" no, the pacer line i have taken everyday to get to the city has rattled and rumbled, taken the twice as long to brake as other lines, costs the exact same amount per ticket as a train in the south, and there has been more crashes on my railway line than all others I have lived on, all by pacers. they stopped being "good" 17 years ago, now they are a nostalgic piece of garbage.
Yeah,we tried the "Bus body on a train chassis" thing. With a slight twist: The cars were unpowered, the locomotive was basically a yard switcher with a fancier body on it. Closest example I could think of for enthusiests across the pond is to think of a Class 20 with an art deco body, and a bunch of unpowered Pacers as coaches behind it. This would be the GM "Aerotrain". Very bumpy and rough, it was a flop. Of course, UK railroading and US railroading followed very different development paths (UK lines connected long existing cities in the beginning, US railroads left a town into the wilderness and hoped business would follow.) This is why our lines tend to be cheaper made than in the UK and Europe, and that rougher, cheaper track was a major issue for the Aerotrain.
the problem I have is no one recognises the south west still has these trains and since no one mentions them I guaranteee once they are all "gone", Devon will still have them
For all their supposed faults, Pacer's have bags of room and nice big windows letting in loads of light. I get the feeling their replacement will have neither.
Not the ones that ran near me. I'd have to sit in the middle of the carriage (where the seats faced each other) to have even a sniff of leg room. And those big windows would rattle and bang. And in winter, they were either frozen or coated in condensation, depending on whether the heating was working or not.
The CAF Civity family Class 195s 3 coach units have a lot more windows, AC for a comfy journey , less rattling and screeching and look like a proper DMU. Their only problem is the ticket price is a hell higher amount at £9 approx. They have a 4 coach EMU variant, the Class 331s.
Actually, he said 'the most reviled' and they are/were almost universally hated by passengers. According to Geoff Marshall, the last one was withdrawn a few days ago, in May 2021.
Why didn't these people look at the class 141, which was actually a Leyland national on a wagon chassis and the forerunner of the design ? Plenty of archive footage exists..... The 142's were significantly different
Because the class 141s saw out its design life and was promptly withdrawn. The same can not be said of the other Pacers which have been kept long after they should have been.
I reckon a lot of passengers in the North will be glad to see the back of these trains. Least they will be getting new trains to replace these clapped out old trains by the end of 2019. They are not fit for service for the 21st Century. These trains have past their sell by date. The Pacer train is over 30 years old its about time they had some new trains. They were built in the 1980s for what was a cheap and nasty stopgap.
I just hope the amount of new rolling stock ordered by Northern and Transpennine Express is enough to tackle overcrowding. I have my doubts. It's all well and good having shiny new trains but if you're trapped in one with little or no space to move it's hardly an improvement. TpExpress introduced brand new Desiro EMUs a few years back on my commuter route into Manchester from Scotland. Here we are in 2016 and on some days you're lucky if you get on at all, never mind get a seat at peak times leaving Manchester.
Apparently they're going to start replacing them in December of this year, but I wouldn't hold your breath. I'd take it more as "Sometime around March 2019". You know what Northern Rail are like.
One thing that I don't quite understand. If the UK health and safety act began in 1974 and the Pacers were built in the 1980s then why the hell don't they meet the current health and safety standards. Why do they shake a lot from inside?
They met the HSA rules of the time. The act is constantly updated to reflect current best practice. Generally existing kit is given exemptions for a certain time-frame to allow a controlled cascade of rolling stock (unless there is an extremely serious flaw that poses an imminent danger). Essentially the Pacer has reached the end of line and it's no longer politically acceptable to grant it further exemptions. Nominally it's because of it's lack of accessibility, but it's general low-level crappiness as a train is the real reason, as it's a source of political embarrassment. For example, the HST is *less* accessible than the pacer, and still has slam doors, but it's widely regarded as one of the best trains in terms of passenger comfort and ride quality, so it's been kept in service way longer than any other mainline unit.
The shaking ride is due to the fact the chassis is from a freight wagon. It has no articulated bogies, just solid, fixed axles, and an incredibly primitive suspension that literally never gave any consideration to human comfort when it was designed, as it was meant to carry freight, not people. The lack of articulated bogies is also why they screech so much when making turns - the rim of the wheel is being ground into the side of the rail every time there's a curve in the track.
@@lmlmd2714 It's pretty bad then, that the Pacers are almost the exclusive users of one of the tightest turns in the railway network at Barry Sidings between Barry and Barry Island. The noise is horrendous and can be heard throughout the town, in combination with the tight bend between Barry Dock and Cadoxton Sidings. It's actually surprising to me that the damn things don't jump off the radius and land in the horrendously noisy housing estate that's been built beside the sidings.
With being a frequent rail user to Morecambe and to Leeds along the Bentham line. I don't have a problem with the pacer. Yeh they're rickety things that trundle along regional lines. I think it gives them a sort of character to them.
@@Class43Harrison I'm staggered at it being quiet, to be honest. I've been on loads and the diesel engine in them is so loud and rattles all the flimsy panelling.
I think the Pacer doesn't deserve all the bad press. At the end of the day each unit has racked up an average of 6 million miles. Not bad for a 'cheap' solution and stopgap. They've transported millions of people to and from work, on days out etc. Yes, they might be antiquated now and yes they do need to be replaced by more modern units. But put it this way, if you bought a really cheap car and got 30+ years and 6 million miles out of it you'd be quite happy. Oh and by the way, I have travelled on em many many times.
I agree. If Pacers were in the South, Tory MPs would be on their hind legs in the Commons. But it's not just the Pacers. Those in the London Commuter regions would not tolerate the state of the bleak and down at heel stations that is the daily lot for the commuter in the north.
Wow never seen this before being a southerner, but they say they are out dated but have basic same design most buses do in the UK, so are we saying buses are out of date too?
Made as a stopgap for BR and still going strong 😀 Manchester first fleet of trams that replaced these on some routes have now been scrapped after 10 years 🤔 Italian trams against a British stopgap trains 😳
My local train service used to be Pacers - running from Huddersfield to Manchester and on to Wigan. They weren't very comfortable even if you did get a seat, and during rush hour that was nigh on impossible. And it didn't help that there wasn't much in the way of grab handles. And on a cold day, even a very full one would still be freezing cold inside - except on the odd occasion the heating was working, in which case the inside was boiling hot and the windows covered in condensation. We don't have them any more, which was a cause for celebration until we discovered the replacement: The Transpennine Express, three coaches of luxury, but only if you're lucky. During the rush hour, these things are jammed full when they leave Leeds and by the time they get to my station they're so packed that your only chance of getting on is to turn yourself into a sardine. Please, Metrolink, get us some trams up here! They might not be luxurious or especially fast, but a relatively reliable 15 minute service would be a massive improvement over cramped hourly trains and irregular buses.
The term 'rolling stock companies' is a bit simplistic and confusing. Rolling stock companies are actually lease finance corporations, who buy fleets of trains or coaches from manufacturers like Bombardier, Alstom, Hitachi etc, and then lease them to train operating companies.
D. Nash We're not getting the D trains now. We're getting the Class 195 (CAF Civity). The Wiki page says they're being rolled out in December of this year, but knowing Northern, that probably actually means sometime around March 2019. As for the Pacers, I think they should be preserved and brought out every now and then for old times sake, but they should have been taken out of regular passenger service a long time ago. They're noisy and have poor crashworthiness as demonstrated in the 1999 Winsford accident.
They still use pacers on my route in Wales although the seats are a bit better than the bus ones on that model shown! I can't believe they are over 30 years old, I though they were a lot older!
Transport for Wales and GWR are the remaining operators running paces now. There not fully gone yet! Loads of them have been preserved on heritage railways around the UK.
It is funny how these cattle wagons were never used in the south east into London! Also they were to be used on branch and rural lines only - however due to the squealing and nodding they were transferred to metropolitan areas. Transport for Wales has just withdrawn their last units. I would love to get a Challenger main battle tank and blow them all up. Why does DfT think donating them to heritage locations helps to make them more acceptable? Even Iran withdrew their Pacers after a few years!
These units will do fine on preserved lines ! WSR could do with a few if they wish to run a public timetabled service for local people. More economical than running steam (and drivers will love them ! )
A pacer is meant to get you from A to B. What it really does is get you to A and E
OHHHHHHHH
what?
I don't understand
@@britishairways744 it meant for short trips on low ridership routes, to meet minimum service requirements, but was used to replace proper trains on longer routes.
🤣
"It's like everything in Britan we were the first and now we're the worst" -map men
I thought it was Unfinished London that said it?
@@thelonesculler you know what I mean
@@benjaminoliver7567 yep
@Mario Petrov I know, I'm just not sure which series it was
"Speaking both as a cyclist and a driver, may i tell you, i *hate* myself." (c) J. Foreman
"why have you brought me to a bus grave yard then?" Bit offensive considering they were on the premises of the North West Vehicle Restoration Trust group, and using one of their immaculately completed classic bus projects for filming :'D
BusThrash
Ha, I knew I recognised that place in Kirkby!
As for the Pacers...
I find them alright myself
But I am a rail enthusiast lol.
They are ok when they are on their own lines.
I will miss them when they are gone, although only a handful make it to Liverpool these days since the 319s took over, but that's another chapter!
Yes, that was my thought on watching that arrogant old fart on this video. In reality i doubt that old spiv even uses public transport !
It's just a figure of speech. It's not meant to be offensive.
@@mirzaahmed6589 Its like walking into a Ferrari heritage centre and saying "why have you brought me to a scrap yard"
@@BusThrash For TV you need to put an emphasis on old and unwanted. Wouldn't be a good script if he said "look at these gorgeous buses" then start whinging about the same vehicle in another form.
"What if... we simply take a bus and make it run on rails ... How hard can it be??" - Top Gear in an alternate timeline
“We deserve what people in the south have got, proper modern transportation”. Yeh, when it turns up 😂
It Sounds like people in the south have the same issues with public transport as us northerners do. Public transport in my opinion is just Shocking, Buses that don't turn up or are late and trains that are delayed, or cancelled regularly. No one is ever going to give up their private transport and lose the convenience of private transport for that.
Nice good one. That's funny 🤣🤣
"we want what the south east have got, proper modern transportation." People living on the isle of wight: Are we a joke to you?
@@guitarplayerforu and then all the transport companies wonder why lots of people don't use them.
Southern class 313
As a commuter I don't care what the train is as long as it shows up on time and gets me home. If a Pacer turns up, yeah its noisy and bounces a bit but can be fairly sure it will get me where I want go. I can't say that of many newer types which seem to collapse in in heap as soon as computers say no. We should be applauding the fact that these trains have soldiered on for twice their intended design life and are still very reliable workhorses.
The truth is you just can't satisfy everyone. An old analogue workhorse is better than all that computerised garbage you get on the rails nowadays, and are they all reliable?? I used to travel on a lot of the MK1 Nationals with Strathclyde buses back in the day, but never had the pleasure of riding the Class 143 and 144 Pacer trains and I believe they're all gone now. Shame. In the end what good is having a modern train if it don't bloody turn up? If it turns up and gets me home then who cares.
This will make Vicki from All the Stations sad.
and yet i wonder how Geoff pulled her.
@@Simon-ui6db he's got a loveable personality
@@jackmellor5536 I think so
@@Simon-ui6dbwell not anymore
Northern should start announcing "We apologize for the fact that your train is a Pacer" everytime one of those show up on a route normally used by the nicer Super Sprinters (155/156/158)
158's are Express Sprinters
The 155/153 are just a pacer with train doors and better bogies
LiftFan wrong
LiftFan Incorrect. They're actually Mk3 carriages with an engine.
LiftFan
153s and 155s are horrible.
Give me a bouncy Pacer any day👍
Late 2019 pacer still around and no where near being removed
Solarstan of RUclips luckily I go on the trains that go to London Waterloo
@@FLAMEalan same I just enjoy pissing of northerners
Just like brexit
I love the pacers they good
@@kieranl8181 learn the English language then compliment a bus
I rode a Pacer in, of all places, Canada. One pair came over in 1986 as a technology demonstrator. I rode it between New Westminster and Abbotsford, British Columbia on a diesel freight-only "short line" which had, decades earlier, been an electric passenger "interurban" line. Despite my very limited train-riding experience at the time, I distinctly remember how rough the ride was.
I have a question for god. WHYYYYYYYYYYYYY
Look, love them.or hate them, I would suggest that few could argue that they were built as a cheap, easily available stop gap, that has FAR outlasted it's intended life and probably more than any other class, has done more to save more branch lines that would have otherwise have closed if they hadn't come along just then. On welded track they are smooth and only bounce when on jointed track. Drivers love them because of their excellent driving position and they show more the massive underinvestment in the railways back then that is only really being addressed now. I would also argue that they alone probably did more to crystalise the reality of how much underinvestment had been allowed to happen. I think we owe a HUGE debt of gratitude to the Pacer that will only truly be acknowledged once they are gone. I for one will miss them.
They have lasted as long as the Class 43 and that was more advanced. It should serve as a testament to Leyland that their National bus was just as good on the rails as it was on the road.
I used to commute on pacers everyday and there was nothing better than hearing the brakes screech into the station at the end of a long day haha. Might’ve been a bit Spartan and a tad bumpy, but these things never missed a beat and, to my own experience, ran like clockwork. There’s a void now because we only have whatever sprinter sets were spared to our line so I really miss these things, they were old but gold :)
I love the Pacers. They're a staple.
They're utter shite.
Staple of what? Sub-mediocrity?
They are SHIT
@@ekvedrek low operating costs and phenominal reliability and availability isnt sub-medoicrity
That old Ribble bus was remarkably well preserved.
The Michelotti designed National is actually quite a good looking machine too.
Then again I'm a sucker for his designs.
@@Reddsoldier Interesting. I associate him chiefly with pre-BL era Triumph cars.
What I find startling is that some pacers cover long distances and the Intercity 125 is 40 years old and when you travel on one you wouldn't think it was 40. Yeah fair enough I know the good old 125s are a high speed express train but it does show what decent investment provides. The reviled pacers are literally noisy bouncy castles on wheels, yeah local services up north and in Wales should be just as good as on the Southern network. A bit of equality and investment would be very nice indeed.
I couldn't put it better myself.
Strangely I traveled on a Pacer today and finally the last leg of the journey home was an 1hr 45 on a 225
Daniel Anderson If you think the Southern or Great Regions regions are great, you are so wrong
Ross London and the South East are getting large quantities of new trains and nowhere in the South East do they have to suffer Pacers!!!
But they do in the Southwest... Anyway Southern's 313's are older, and only slightly better than, a Pacer. I only had to suffer one once and pity those who have to regularly. The new 700's aren't exactly comfortable either. And they don't have guards (Or the one I was on didn't!).
The irony is that whilst the Pacer is reviled the Leyland National Bus is generally warmly remembered.
says someone who has never traveled on a pacer - it is the freight wagon bit that makes it so shit - it suspension was designed to keep freight from being destroyed.
I LOVE the Pacer trains! I'm really sad they're gone now.
Northern Rail still have them in the fleet they also still have the class 150 and class 158 sprinters as well.
@@TheDJJamster92 they have got rid of them now
plenty on heritage lines. some offer driver experiance too
Me too!
Same 😢
The old Pacers did the Job in the south Wales valleys for 30 years they gave awesome service on very tough hilly routes they kept the valley lines running for so long just a good old workhorse they are missed in the valleys
As an update their all withdrawn now. I agree they were a 'stopgap', however there also the argument they saved alot of the railway due to their cheap running cost (british railways was really struggling at the time). So dont mock. I would also argue they were far more efficient and less likely to break down than newer one, hence why they lasted so long!. For anyone missing them lots of preserved lines bought them because they at least saw the benefits so their still plenty around. Their not entirely gone forever :-)
Leyland National 2...I never got to drive them! A beast of an engine! 😈👍
Never thought , I would find you here, Lol!
Oh hello
DoubleDeckerAnton why hello sir!
Hello there Anton!
I'm everywhere...😁🔝👌
I love em 😂 the bouncing used to keep me awake on my way home from work for just over a year
That's a long commute.
firstly, I'm a Yank and have never been to the UK - Only The Netherlands in that neck of the woods...
I operated one of these in Train Simulator 2017...it was pretty odd. The first thing I noticed was, wow, this engine sounds odd even for a diesel. It sounded like a car's engine or a truck perhaps. It also accelerated oddly slow, and had a funnily high acceleration between say 50 and 70 miles per hour, which may have been exceeding its maximum operating speed, anyway. Wow.
Yep, that's because the engine was also from a British Leyland bus. The Pacers were originally kitted out with Leyland TL11 6 cylinder engines. They weren't particularly impressive in the buses, so they didn't exactly take the railways by storm either. I think some later variants with fitted with Cummins engines instead. They were ridiculously loud. There's virtually zero sound or vibration insulation.
the maximum speed is 75mph, if you want more (extremely biased) information then i reccomend this video:
ruclips.net/video/AbAptwtUF0o/видео.html
"At that very moment, one of these Frankenstein trains creeps up behind them." The fact that they said Frankenstein train!!! HAHA perfect description!!!
@Craig F. Thompson yeah I know. That's why it's funny because it's the equivalent of a Frankenstein creation.
@Craig F. Thompson I wondered which pedant would notice that. Which of course makes me one too.
As a recent migrant to the North fron dan sarf, I've only recently experienced pacers. I'm no train buff or a regular commuter, just an occasional day tripper but I'll offer my opinion. First impressions were that this was obviously a vehicle that had been in service for a few years as they're somewhat dated in appearance, inside and out. I didn't feel the ride quality was noticeably bumpy and I travelled on virtually empty trains as well as rush hour services. The pa system was virtually useless even though I was sat beside the speaker so I resorted to looking out of the window to keep track of my progress. The only other thing I noticed was when pulling away, the driver had to give it some gas and I got the impression that the gearbox was clutch operated but I doubt that's the case, probably automatics. If they're reasonably reliable and cost effective to operate, I couldn't really pick holes in them.
Yeah, their ride quality was OK on straight, good quality track like on the Liverpool-Manchester line, but they were really bad on curvy branch lines. So much that they swapped the pacers out for Class 15x's on some of these lines.
hydraulic transmission on the pacers, the reason why it sounded like the drivers had to input a lot of throttle to get going is that the transmission takes a few seconds to fill with oil and engage, so for those few seconds the engine is under a small load and so it surges quickly to a high RPM (or even the rev limiter) before slowing and settling down as the transmission fills and it takes up the load. this gives the impression that the driver is wacking it into full power to get going whereas really theyll only use ~50 percent power to move off
What I find funny is how much they were hated but yet so many have been preserved including 142001 which is part of the national collection
Notice how at 3:13 the train at the front was a Class 142 Pacer, but at 3:20 the train at the front magically changes to a Class 150 Sprinter.
It is probably a different service altogether.
illuminati
Connor Watson I didn't know that they were buses do you want them to stay
Rip Curl 69 // RC69 fair enough
Rip Curl 69 // RC69 I have to deal with them regularly
I actually like the Pacers and older rolling stock. They have character and charm.
LightingDesk in terms of there being no dull moment when riding them I can see what you mean and for better or worse, they are a part of the railways history
I loved the sound these made on my local line as a kid. Used to catch one a quid return to Boro. Beautiful trip from the moors to Boro too.
Commute on them, you'll lose that opinion of them pretty quickly. Even heritage stock is more comfortable.
Yep, give me a good Merseyrail 507 built in the 1970s rather than some of the unreliable, foreign junk they import nowadays.
They are not exactly the most modern trains out there, but they do have character and always seem to be reliable
Dead easy...you just load the passengers on the bus then load the bus onto a train trailer, problem solved.
Craig F. Thompson So that's Airbus inspiration for their planes? ;-)XD
Then say the train has broken down and use the rail replacement bus service.
Porto needs em
PACERS ARE LIFE, BEST TRAINS TO EXIST.
Pacers, you either love 'em or hate 'em with a passion. Personally I like 'em, not exactly a looker, by neither was the Apollo LEM, both got the job done at the end of the day.
The Pacer would be about as comfortable too, if the people on board were in a zero G envrionment.... I used to commute on one of these in Devon. It was awful :(
Repeated quote - you clearly have never had to commute on these - they are freight wagon with seats !!!!!
@@Tom55data Much more than that!
Why didn't they fit Bogie's to the high speed freight wagon before putting the bus body onto it? It'd have mean't the pacer would have been more like a train that started life as a train so to speak, they would have been as comfortable as one too. Although I didn't find them uncomfortable personally, I liked the noise of their 6 cylinder 10 litre Cummins turbo diesel. engine
@@bikerguychris33 It is very simple, if you were to read @shipwright1918 's comment. They got the job done- now the question is 'what was the job'? The job was to get the operating cost per hour down to around 1/3 of the DMUs they replaced. Start sticking heavy bogies on then it's more £ to build, more £ to operate, more £ to service. Look at the 150s- more suitable in many circumstances but nearly twice the cost per unit per hour.
i've gotten quite sentimental about pacers, i agree they are horrid things but back in the day in winter when it was freezing me and me mam went to the metro centre and i always fell asleep on the way back listening to the struggling engines and breathing in the exhaust fumes which was the only thing which helped keep the coaches warm then on to a sprinter or a 37 back along the coast yam
My first time I went on one today and it's better than a Pendolino any day! Also more secure as you can see everything that happens
Don't know? But you could be dreaming at night going on a pacer on the opposite way. The intercity trains and modern intercity trains are way better. Get over it.
I think that around 2030ish there will be wave of nostalgia for pacer trains and railway preservation societies will rescue a couple from the scrapheaps and restore them and run tours on them like they do with the old steam era trains and carriages.
1973Washu they'd probably need to be able to run on alternative fuel by then as fossil fuels are starting to run low so might be little left by 2030. I love steam engines and the way they smell. The pacer has served us well considering they've ran solid for 30 or more years now, but i think its time to move on now, and like you say, the heritage railways could use class 142's once they where restored as they're part of our British heritage.
Its 2023 and i still take a Pacer to work. Government promisses, goverment not delivers- what a shocker
weren't they all withdrawn in 2021?
I used to love riding on these trains on the Colne to Blackpool South line. Good times.
HEY.............. Leave the pacer alone. Im a pacer driver and i can tell all of you begrudgers that the pacer is one of the best trains ever to grace the railways of this country. Honest, reliable, and good old fashioned british engernering and still going 30 years on. None of ye pureists or train spotters have a clue what ye are talking about. DOPES
i agree, my cousin was also a pacer driver in his early days of driving, he now drives 350s for london midland but still looks back on them with fondness, as i do
pacers suck, "reliable" no, the pacer line i have taken everyday to get to the city has rattled and rumbled, taken the twice as long to brake as other lines, costs the exact same amount per ticket as a train in the south, and there has been more crashes on my railway line than all others I have lived on, all by pacers. they stopped being "good" 17 years ago, now they are a nostalgic piece of garbage.
Pacers are fine
the price of the ticket has nothing to do with the particular train
what's the name of the line you travel on?
I love his scarfe, posh people always wear scarves, even in 30C temps.
That Leyland bus is an absolute design classic. Remind me of my childhood.
James Evans www.flickr.com/photos/eagle50043/6675397035 lol :)
I have to admit the Pacer trains are better than the trains all the trains in USA
You’re comparing a glorified service bus with the Acela?
Yeah,we tried the "Bus body on a train chassis" thing. With a slight twist: The cars were unpowered, the locomotive was basically a yard switcher with a fancier body on it. Closest example I could think of for enthusiests across the pond is to think of a Class 20 with an art deco body, and a bunch of unpowered Pacers as coaches behind it. This would be the GM "Aerotrain". Very bumpy and rough, it was a flop. Of course, UK railroading and US railroading followed very different development paths (UK lines connected long existing cities in the beginning, US railroads left a town into the wilderness and hoped business would follow.) This is why our lines tend to be cheaper made than in the UK and Europe, and that rougher, cheaper track was a major issue for the Aerotrain.
Yes I agree 🇬🇧🇬🇧🇬🇧🇬🇧🇬🇧🇬🇧
ChesterWolf The Griffin i agree that useless train better than many trains in the UK/US
In America, more people fly domestically. There isn’t a huge rail system there
I'm from the future in 2022...The queen has died,strikes are an everyday occurrence,And the pacers are gone
Finally somebody explains the ‘bus on rails’ concept to others. Now I can tell them to stop asking me and watch this video
BANG! and the train is gonnnne!
Save the donkeys!
(Nodding Donkey) a nickname for Pacers.
TrainTrackTrav I
Yes, let's save them from their work by sending them to be scrapped!
boo, crazycash, boo
SEGA Dreamcast HALLUIEGH
iv`e never had a problem with these trains you get a better view when traveling on them
I thought I had achieved my moment of fame being on BBC2. Now it seems I have reached the even greater heights of RUclips! Can you spot the BluTack?
Eric Woodcock what is this documentary called?
the problem I have is no one recognises the south west still has these trains and since no one mentions them I guaranteee once they are all "gone", Devon will still have them
Yeah but the South West has no more than 8 of those pacers whereas in the North they have about 102 out of the 340 total northern fleet
Super Skyline... Atw have a load at Cardiff
It's Me ATW have about 30 (ish) of them in Wales out of the total 125 ATW fleet, doesn't sound like a lot to me.
Super Skyline... Is that all they have there now? I thought it was a lot more.. I take back my comment... They have a few there.
It's Me I think there was a huge number before but if I'm correct today they have 30 of them
They’re gone now. It feels so empty without em
Ah humans
Nothing beats the pacers I love them
Is it wrong that i absolutely adore the Pacer?
No, i kinda love them
Yes I do have a soft spot for them, need one in model form!
MickMaan yes
NO it isn't wrong
No,I like them too.
These trains are passed there sell by date
For all their supposed faults, Pacer's have bags of room and nice big windows letting in loads of light. I get the feeling their replacement will have neither.
Not the ones that ran near me. I'd have to sit in the middle of the carriage (where the seats faced each other) to have even a sniff of leg room. And those big windows would rattle and bang. And in winter, they were either frozen or coated in condensation, depending on whether the heating was working or not.
The CAF Civity family Class 195s 3 coach units have a lot more windows, AC for a comfy journey , less rattling and screeching and look like a proper DMU. Their only problem is the ticket price is a hell higher amount at £9 approx. They have a 4 coach EMU variant, the Class 331s.
I can remember the pacer trains on the oldham line about 10 years ago, relieved is an understatement when the trams took their place!!
Joe Dyson We still have them in Sheffield!
Got to admit the Pacer is cute lol
got to say this was pretty good, coming from dorset it was good knowing more about the north
Where I live, we have to get on the class 142 pacer to go somewhere 😂😂😂
Lucky you
“Britain’s most vile trains”. Has she (the narrator) ever heard of a bubble car or an IET? Those are the most vile trains in Britain.
The pacer is beautiful and a great example of british ingenuity whereas the 800 is dodgy foreign plastic
@@wucgqwhcvuqwbkchqj The 395 is made by the same company, and a lovely train. The only difference, is the operators....
Actually, he said 'the most reviled' and they are/were almost universally hated by passengers. According to Geoff Marshall, the last one was withdrawn a few days ago, in May 2021.
At least the IETs are actual trains...?
@@NaenaeGaming yeah, shite trains though, pacers werent much more uncomfortable, were a lot cheaper to run, and were a lot more reliable than IETs
2020 2 months away and they’re still very much in use,
The majority of my daily commutes are basically me being stuck on a Pacer for nearly an hour AND THEY ARE THE WORST
Good old arriva pacers
I like pacers
there going in 2019
GOOD!!
Then again they are very noisy.
There going to have the last few gone in 2034 but most by the end of 2020
THE 142 HAS GOT A CUTE FRONT
And now they're finally gone.
Why didn't these people look at the class 141, which was actually a Leyland national on a wagon chassis and the forerunner of the design ? Plenty of archive footage exists.....
The 142's were significantly different
Because the class 141s saw out its design life and was promptly withdrawn. The same can not be said of the other Pacers which have been kept long after they should have been.
Saw the Pacer rolling past Ravenglass and Eskdale Railway in Cumbria
I remember the Leyland Nationals and Titans. They were slow when moving off. I used them when travelling to school.
Let’s admit it, we all have a soft spot for the pacer
"DfT promise the end by 2020" in this documentary apparently from 2017. Finally achieved 2022. Not bad for a stop-gap railbus train.
I reckon a lot of passengers in the North will be glad to see the back of these trains. Least they will be getting new trains to replace these clapped out old trains by the end of 2019. They are not fit for service for the 21st Century. These trains have past their sell by date. The Pacer train is over 30 years old its about time they had some new trains. They were built in the 1980s for what was a cheap and nasty stopgap.
I just hope the amount of new rolling stock ordered by Northern and Transpennine Express is enough to tackle overcrowding. I have my doubts. It's all well and good having shiny new trains but if you're trapped in one with little or no space to move it's hardly an improvement. TpExpress introduced brand new Desiro EMUs a few years back on my commuter route into Manchester from Scotland. Here we are in 2016 and on some days you're lucky if you get on at all, never mind get a seat at peak times leaving Manchester.
Apparently they're going to start replacing them in December of this year, but I wouldn't hold your breath. I'd take it more as "Sometime around March 2019". You know what Northern Rail are like.
One thing that I don't quite understand. If the UK health and safety act began in 1974 and the Pacers were built in the 1980s then why the hell don't they meet the current health and safety standards. Why do they shake a lot from inside?
Waleed Arif because the act is constantly being updated, it's not the same act as 1974
They must be meeting some kind of safety legislation, or otherwise they wouldn’t be running
They met the HSA rules of the time. The act is constantly updated to reflect current best practice. Generally existing kit is given exemptions for a certain time-frame to allow a controlled cascade of rolling stock (unless there is an extremely serious flaw that poses an imminent danger). Essentially the Pacer has reached the end of line and it's no longer politically acceptable to grant it further exemptions. Nominally it's because of it's lack of accessibility, but it's general low-level crappiness as a train is the real reason, as it's a source of political embarrassment. For example, the HST is *less* accessible than the pacer, and still has slam doors, but it's widely regarded as one of the best trains in terms of passenger comfort and ride quality, so it's been kept in service way longer than any other mainline unit.
The shaking ride is due to the fact the chassis is from a freight wagon. It has no articulated bogies, just solid, fixed axles, and an incredibly primitive suspension that literally never gave any consideration to human comfort when it was designed, as it was meant to carry freight, not people. The lack of articulated bogies is also why they screech so much when making turns - the rim of the wheel is being ground into the side of the rail every time there's a curve in the track.
@@lmlmd2714 It's pretty bad then, that the Pacers are almost the exclusive users of one of the tightest turns in the railway network at Barry Sidings between Barry and Barry Island. The noise is horrendous and can be heard throughout the town, in combination with the tight bend between Barry Dock and Cadoxton Sidings. It's actually surprising to me that the damn things don't jump off the radius and land in the horrendously noisy housing estate that's been built beside the sidings.
Love this video of race DMU with classic bus!! 👏👍
The Pacer is an outer-suburban tram.
With being a frequent rail user to Morecambe and to Leeds along the Bentham line. I don't have a problem with the pacer. Yeh they're rickety things that trundle along regional lines. I think it gives them a sort of character to them.
I swear when they get withdrawn they are gonna miss it
Wtf there horrible!
They've still got the pacer, and the people around here say YES!
Interesting twist is that the Leyland National was a firm favourite and very fondly remembered!
I actually like the old things. They were very clever thinking. I also have fond memories of those buses.
Arriva Wales, Wrexham to Bidston. Top Quality journey.
I went on one last weekend and it was really quiet. I thoroughly enjoyed the ride.
And then it left the station and your enjoyment evaporated, right?
@@leopold7562 yeah kind of. I'd never been on one before and that one was actually decent! It was so silent and comfortable too!!
@@Class43Harrison I'm staggered at it being quiet, to be honest. I've been on loads and the diesel engine in them is so loud and rattles all the flimsy panelling.
@@leopold7562 yeah I was surprised too! But it was great!
I think you should see a doctor urgently, you've clearly gone deaf and lost all feeling below the neck.
Only the British would think to combine the top of a bus and the bottom of a freight wagon and come up with the Pacer lol
It's a very ingenious solution born out of practically rock-bottom budgets.
I think the Pacer doesn't deserve all the bad press. At the end of the day each unit has racked up an average of 6 million miles. Not bad for a 'cheap' solution and stopgap. They've transported millions of people to and from work, on days out etc. Yes, they might be antiquated now and yes they do need to be replaced by more modern units. But put it this way, if you bought a really cheap car and got 30+ years and 6 million miles out of it you'd be quite happy. Oh and by the way, I have travelled on em many many times.
You watch a few episodes of WTYP pod and suddenly your recommendations are full of stuff like this.
I agree. If Pacers were in the South, Tory MPs would be on their hind legs in the Commons. But it's not just the Pacers. Those in the London Commuter regions would not tolerate the state of the bleak and down at heel stations that is the daily lot for the commuter in the north.
Nearly 2022 and pacers are still going strong! Horrid things
They were gone by 2022.....perhaps visit your local railway more often!
Wow never seen this before being a southerner, but they say they are out dated but have basic same design most buses do in the UK, so are we saying buses are out of date too?
No because buses have evolved in to something modern whilst the pacer is based on a 1970's bus on a high speed freight wagon!!!
Don’t worry it’s only temporary….. 30 years later
Saw LEV1 at Ipswich in about 77, as a teenager I was gobsmacked that someone had put a Leyland National body on a train!
You gotta say that they lasted well
Like I learned over the past 20 . There is nothing that lasts as long as a stopgap
Made as a stopgap for BR and still going strong 😀 Manchester first fleet of trams that replaced these on some routes have now been scrapped after 10 years 🤔 Italian trams against a British stopgap trains 😳
The difference is the money was available to replace the trams at the end of their design life, but not the pacers.
My local train service used to be Pacers - running from Huddersfield to Manchester and on to Wigan. They weren't very comfortable even if you did get a seat, and during rush hour that was nigh on impossible. And it didn't help that there wasn't much in the way of grab handles. And on a cold day, even a very full one would still be freezing cold inside - except on the odd occasion the heating was working, in which case the inside was boiling hot and the windows covered in condensation.
We don't have them any more, which was a cause for celebration until we discovered the replacement: The Transpennine Express, three coaches of luxury, but only if you're lucky. During the rush hour, these things are jammed full when they leave Leeds and by the time they get to my station they're so packed that your only chance of getting on is to turn yourself into a sardine.
Please, Metrolink, get us some trams up here! They might not be luxurious or especially fast, but a relatively reliable 15 minute service would be a massive improvement over cramped hourly trains and irregular buses.
You need 6 coach sets now. Enough jamming like that! We cant manage inside a 12 car broad gauge train on some routes they get so jampacked.
I think the bumpyniss is due to the old wooden sleepers rotting away under the train tracks on old branch lines
2 days ago on the 27th Novemeber 2020 the pacer went out of service, 1985 to 2020.
And it was correct that it would go in 2020.
those models they used are actually so detailed
The term 'rolling stock companies' is a bit simplistic and confusing. Rolling stock companies are actually lease finance corporations, who buy fleets of trains or coaches from manufacturers like Bombardier, Alstom, Hitachi etc, and then lease them to train operating companies.
keep the PACERS, keep the PACERS, keep the PACERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Ditch the Pacers: roll on the D trains! (If they stop catching fire...)
Convert them into buses...
Videogame Matt ! yeah!
useless, they still get people from a to b dont they? and they're more reliable than the class 37s on the cumbrian coast
D. Nash We're not getting the D trains now. We're getting the Class 195 (CAF Civity). The Wiki page says they're being rolled out in December of this year, but knowing Northern, that probably actually means sometime around March 2019. As for the Pacers, I think they should be preserved and brought out every now and then for old times sake, but they should have been taken out of regular passenger service a long time ago. They're noisy and have poor crashworthiness as demonstrated in the 1999 Winsford accident.
They still use pacers on my route in Wales although the seats are a bit better than the bus ones on that model shown! I can't believe they are over 30 years old, I though they were a lot older!
Transport for Wales and GWR are the remaining operators running paces now. There not fully gone yet! Loads of them have been preserved on heritage railways around the UK.
one is even now part of a school..
The government just announced that they will nationalise Northern Rail...
You you're crap when the Torries want to nationalise your company.
It is funny how these cattle wagons were never used in the south east into London! Also they were to be used on branch and rural lines only - however due to the squealing and nodding they were transferred to metropolitan areas. Transport for Wales has just withdrawn their last units. I would love to get a Challenger main battle tank and blow them all up. Why does DfT think donating them to heritage locations helps to make them more acceptable? Even Iran withdrew their Pacers after a few years!
South west is still full of pacer trains the only newer trains you see are HST's going long distances but the rest of devon has to deal with pacers
I'm sure there are no more than 8 pacers in the South West. There are many sprinters and super sprinters but not many pacers.
Underscore 12358132134 Yet HST are way nicer and more comfortable. Roll on the HSTgti and Turbos cascade!
Nathan Witten Same with Northern
i kinda love the trodding donkey's as ive been on some & they never botherd me
These units will do fine on preserved lines ! WSR could do with a few if they wish to run a public timetabled service for local people. More economical than running steam (and drivers will love them ! )