The Class 180 Adelante Story, Success or Failure? (Revised and Re-Published Version)

The Class 180 is a fleet of 14 diesel-hydraulic multiple unit passenger trains manufactured by Alstom at its Washwood Heath factory between 2000 and 2001.
They were originally ordered by First Great Western in October 1997.
As part of its franchise commitments the operator was required to increase services between London Paddington, Newport, Cardiff and Swansea from hourly to half-hourly.
However, they did not have enough HST sets to cover these extra services. After looking at several alternatives it was decided that the best option was order a new fleet of DMUs capable of 125mph running.
Alstom was chosen to build these new units.
The company was in the process of developing the Coradia 1000 family of multiple units and several types had already entered or were due to enter service with various train operating companies across Britain.
These included the Class 460 for the Gatwick Express service, the Class 334 for Scotrail, the Class 458 for South West Trains and Class 175 two and three car units for First North Western.
The resulting unit was designated Class 180 and was largely based on the exiting Class 175s. Fourteen units were ordered at a cost of £70m.
They were fitted with Cummins QSK19 power plants coupled to Voith Hydraulic T 312 transmissions which could power sets to a top speed of 125mph. They were given the name Adelante.
They were initially due to enter service in time for the May 2001 timetable change but manufacturing delays meant this was put back to December 2001.
Due to this delay in May 2001 FGW was forced to introduce Class 47 hauled Mark 2 sets on London Paddington to Penzance services to release InterCity 125 sets for the additional Cardiff services.
After a year's delay, the Class 180s began working on the Great Western Mainline operating between London Paddington, Bristol and Cardiff and later to the Cotswold Line towards Oxford and Worcester.
However, the type suffered from poor reliability due to frequent and recurring technical problems, particularly in regards to its hydraulic transmission system.
While FGW considered investing £63m to improve their reliability they ultimately decided to return all of its Class 180s to the train leasing company Angel Trains.
They were replaced by HST sets purchased from the Midland Mainline.
Most of which comprised redundant Virgin Cross Country sets that had been hired for use on the Project Rio relief service between London St Pancras and Manchester Piccadilly.
In December 2008 three Class 180s were taken up by Northern Rail to increase capacity on the Blackpool North to Hazel Grove and Manchester Victoria commuter services via Preston and Bolton.
In November 2011 Northern hand back the Class 180s and replaced them with ex-London Midland Class 150s.
During 2008 Hull Trains hired in four Class 180s to replace its Class 222 fleet. They operated the type until 2020 when they were replaced by the new build Class 802s.
These four units were then transferred to East Midlands Railway with the first entering service on the Midland Mainline in January 2020.
On summer Saturdays during 2022 they were used to operate additional EMR services between Derby and Skegness.
They were withdrawn by East Midlands Railway in May 2023.
During May 2012 five Class 180s returned to service with First Great Western to work the Cotswold Line between London Paddington, Oxford, Worcester and Great Malvern. They would continue in service until 2017 when the new Class 800 bi-mode IETs began to enter service.
In 2009 the open access train operating company Grand Central leased several Class 180s to replace its fleet of HSTs to operate services between Sunderland, Bradford and Kings Cross. It would eventually go on to lease twelve Class 180s and is currently the only operator of the type on the network.

[@EM-yk1dw]

Excellent and informative film once again.

[@LinesideSouthEast]

Many thanks!

[@RickyNowis]

Well, they are decent units if not for reliability issues with them. It'll good to see Grand Central having all 12 Adelante units. Nice coverage of the units :-)