East Midlands Trains ex TPE Class 158's

[John_142]

The question i ask about these particular 158's is did they Start life as Cross Country as for example i was on 158 779 last night and have been on sevral of these and the carpets seem to be red and don't match the seat covers which i find unusuall.

Also i do rember when cross country was first operated by Virgin Trains and they used 158's and as i used to ride the 17.00 from St.Helens Central to Liverpool as this was a 158 operated by Virgin Trains Cross Country i do rember them having red seat covers and carpets and the 1st Class being larger than on other 158's.

Is there away of seeing were these units started there life as it would be very interesting to see how far and wide they have traveled.

Also with regards to the seats covers it would be possible that TPE only changed them and not the carpets when first transfered to that operation when the TPE franchise was with MTL as Northern Spirit.

[222007]

There were as you correctly stated a number of 158's operated by virgin and would make sense for the units you describe to be the way they are. As for transpennine express i don't recall First doing any interior refresh on the units as the 185's were ordered shortly after the franchise was let but MTR or arriva could possibly have re-newed the seat coverings. Also we must remember the 158's originally started with Regional railways befor privatisation, of the top of my head there are not places a 158 hasnt been.Also SWT's seat coverings are red so its not that unusual for 158's to have this colour. I hope some of this is usefull

[John_142]

Yes cheers very mutch !

[dlh1983]

The 158s that were used by Transpennine Express on the 'North' routes always had blue seats with a red bit at the top and red carpets for as long as I can remember. Some or all of the ones used on the 'South' route had grey seats.

Transpennine Express had 158s long before Voyager trains were brought in to operation, so I think it's unlikely that they are former Virgin trains. The dark red with a gold splash was Northern Spirit's livery (not Virgin's) which Arriva Trains Northern didn't bother changing.

There must have been refurbishment on some 158s though as some of had manual doors on the toilet while others had electric operated doors.

158s used on Cross Country routes may have been transferred to the former Central Trains franchisee. As some of the 156s that Northern Rail use (the ones that were/still in the First North Western livery) have got Central Trains notices on which First and Northern have not done a very good job of removing, so Central Trains must have got some other trains to replace them and I'm guessing that was well before they got the 170s that Midland Mainline no longer required.

[martin adamson]

I remember once travelling on a TPX in 2004 not long after First took over from Sheffield to Manchester and the seats were grey. Apart from that all the other 158s I travelled on afterwards have been dark blue/red.

When First took over did they transfer some of their First North Western blue 158s onto the TPX network as I remember seeing some one at York during the year they took over.

[hstudent]

Originally Posted by John_142

The question i ask about these particular 158's is did they Start life as Cross Country as for example i was on 158 779 last night and have been on sevral of these and the carpets seem to be red and don't match the seat covers which i find unusuall.

Also i do rember when cross country was first operated by Virgin Trains and they used 158's and as i used to ride the 17.00 from St.Helens Central to Liverpool as this was a 158 operated by Virgin Trains Cross Country i do rember them having red seat covers and carpets and the 1st Class being larger than on other 158's.

It may have been that at one time Northern Spirit decided the carpets needed replacing, but the seat covers were in a good enough condition. (You may have seen Northern's former FNW 156s that are currently in that sort of state.) Alternatively, it could have been that it was decided that making the full interior red may not be popular so Northern Spirit opted to use two colours.

From information on that people have submitted on the Internet it seems that Virgin had 158s which were used only on the Manchester to Scotland route, when Voyagers came in to operation the 158s were transferred to Arriva Trains Northern in Regional Railways livery and are now with First Great Western.

[hstudent]

Originally Posted by David A Hicks

I remember once travelling on a TPX in 2004 not long after First took over from Sheffield to Manchester and the seats were grey. Apart from that all the other 158s I travelled on afterwards have been dark blue/red.

When First took over did they transfer some of their First North Western blue 158s onto the TPX network as I remember seeing some one at York during the year they took over.

First definetly did use First North Western 158s on TP Express routes between when they took over the TP Express franchisee and when the Northern Rail franchise was formed, as on one occasion I caught a First North Western 158 running a Manchester Piccadilly to Bridlington route and it was the same 158 when I made a return journey.